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VARIOUS FRAGMENTS 



HERBERT SPENCER 



\ %gter of Coyf^ 

WO COPIES RECEIVED 

NEW YORK U 

D. APPLETON AND COMPANY 



V 



THE LIBRARY 
OF CONGRESS 

WASHINGTON 


Copyright, 1897, 

By D. APPLETON AND COMPANY. 







PREFACE. 


Several of the following fragments contain ideas and 
suggestions which ought not, I think, to remain buried, 
and practically lost, in their original places of publi¬ 
cation. Preservation may, I think, prove to be of some 
importance. As for the rest, I do not know that they 
are all intrinsically of such value as to be worthy of a 
permanent form. But it has seemed that along with 
republication of the fragments of chief significance, 
there might fitly go a republication of those of less sig¬ 
nificance, which would not have been worth republish¬ 
ing by themselves. 

H. S. 


July , 1897. 


V 




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THE BOOKSELLING-QUESTION. 

In April 1852 was published in the Westminster 
Review , an essay on “ The Commerce of Literature,” 
written by Mr. (afterwards Dr.) Chapman, then a pub¬ 
lisher and the owner of the review. The picture which 
it drew of the trade-regulations and their results, initi¬ 
ated an agitation among authors, in which I took part, 
and in furtherance of it published the following letter 
in The Times for April 5, 1852. This letter, signed 
“ An Author,” I reproduce partly because it shows the 
condition of the book-trade in the middle of the century, 
and partly because it bears significantly on a current 
question—namely whether the system then in force shall 
be re-established. 

Somewhat more than a year since I published a work 
of which the advertised price is 12s. I have now before 
me an account up to Christmas last, wherein I find my¬ 
self credited with the copies sold at the rate of 8s. 6d. 
each. The trade custom of giving 25 for the price of 24 
reduces this to somewhat less that 8s. 2d. Further, my 
publisher deducts 10 per cent, commission for all sales 
he makes in my behalf; so that ultimately the net sum 
per copy payable to me becomes 7s. 4d. Out of this 

1 


2 


THE BOOKSELLING-QUESTION. 


7s. 4d. per copy I have to pay for the composition, print¬ 
ing, paper, and binding; for the advertising, which 
threatens to reach 50 1.\ and for the 30 odd copies sent 
to the national libraries, newspapers, and reviews. The 
result is that, though of its kind the book has been a 
very successful one, my account up to Christmas last 
shows a balance of 80Z. against me. Possibly in 18 
months hence the work will have paid its expenses, and I 
am even not without hope that it will leave me some 
10L in pocket as a reward for my two years’ toil. Should 
it do so, however, I shall be unusually fortunate; for my 
publisher tells me that the great majority of works hav¬ 
ing, like mine, a philosophical character, entail loss. 

Now, with all their skill in mystification, the Book¬ 
sellers’ Association will find it difficult to show that out 
of a selling price of 12s. the proportion set aside to pay 
for printing, paper, binding, advertising, gratuitous 
copies, and author, should be 7s. 4d., while 4s. 8d. may 
reasonably be charged for conveyance to the reader. In 
these days of cheap carriage 60 per cent, for cost of pro¬ 
duction, and 40 per cent, for porterage, is a somewhat 
anomalous division. 

Mr. Murray says it is in great measure an author’s 
question. He is right, and authors will prove much less 
intelligent than I take them to be if they do not see how 
immensely their own interests, as well as those of the 
public, would be served by a diminution of these ex¬ 
orbitant trade profits. Let any one refer to Porter’s 
Progress of the Nation , and there note the many cases in 
which a small reduction of price has been followed by a 
great increase of consumption, and he cannot avoid the 
inference that a 20 per cent, decrease in the vendor’s 
charge for a book would cause a much more than pro- 


AN ELEMENT IN METHOD. 


3 


portionate increase in its sale; and as this decrease would 
be in the cost of agency, and not in the author’s price, the 
extra sale would be so much clear profit to him. Books 
that now entail loss would pay their expenses, and books 
that now only pay their expenses would bring something 
like a reasonable remuneration. 

Should the publishers and booksellers persist in their 
restrictive policy, which is injurious not only to authors 
and the public, but, I believe, in the long run even to 
themselves, I think that as a matter of business authors 
| will be justified in declining to publish with any who 
belong to the combination. 

The movement initiated, as above said, by Mr. Chap¬ 
man’s article, resulted in an agreement to arbitrate be¬ 
tween the authors and the traders. The arbitrators ap¬ 
pointed were Lord Campbell, Mr. Grote, and Dean 
Milman. They gave their decision in favour of the 
• authors, and the trade-regulations which enforced the 
system of “ net prices ” were at once abolished. 


AN ELEMENT IN METHOD. 

The fragment which here follows was originally the 
introductory chapter to Part III of The Principles of 
Psychology (first edition 1855). When preparing a sec¬ 
ond and enlarged edition of the work in 1868—70, I 
omitted it as not being relevant to Psychology in par¬ 
ticular but as being relevant rather to science in general; 




4 


AN ELEMENT IN METHOD. 


and I then entertained the thought of making it part of 
an essay “ On Method ” to he prefixed to First Princi¬ 
ples . Pre-occupation prevented me from carrying out 
that intention and ill-health now obliges me to abandon 
it. But the thought which this fragment embodies has, 
I think, a degree of importance which makes preserva¬ 
tion desirable; and I therefore decide to include it in 
this volume. 

It is a dominant characteristic of Intelligence, viewed 
in its successive stages of evolution, that its processes, 
which, as originally performed, were not accompanied 
with a consciousness of the manner in which they were 
performed, or of their adaptation to the ends achieved, 
become eventually both conscious and systematic. Hot 
simply is this seen on comparing the actions popularly 
distinguished as instinctive and rational; but it is seen 
on comparing the successive phases of rationality itself. 
Thus, children reason, but do not know it. Youths know 
empirically what reason is, and when they are reasoning. 
Cultivated adults reason intentionally, with a view to 
certain results. The more advanced of such presently 
inquire after what manner they reason. And finally, a 
few reach a state in which they consciously conform their 
reasonings to those logical principles which analysis dis¬ 
closes. To exhibit this law of mental progress clearly, 
and to show the extent of its application, some illustra¬ 
tions must be cited. 

Classification supplies us with one. All intelligent 
action presupposes a grouping together of things pos¬ 
sessing like properties. To know what is eatable and 
what not; which creatures to pursue and which to fly; 


AN ELEMENT IN METHOD. 


5 


what materials are fit for these purposes and what for 
those; alike imply the arrangement of objects into classes 
of such nature that, from certain sensible characteristics 
of each, certain other characteristics are foreseen. It is 
manifest that throughout all life, brute and human, more 
or less of this discrimination is exercised; that it is more 
exercised by higher creatures than by lower; and that 
successful action is in part dependent on the extent to 
which it is pushed. How it needs but to open a work on 
Chemistry, Mineralogy, Botany, or Zoology, to see how 
this classification which the child, the savage, and the 
peasant, carry on spontaneously, and without thinking 
what they are doing, is carried on by men of science sys¬ 
tematically, knowingly, and with deliberate purpose. It 
needs but to watch their respective proceedings, to see 
that the degrees of likeness and unlikeness, which uncon¬ 
sciously guide the ignorant in forming classes and sub¬ 
classes, are consciously used by the cultured to the same 
end. And it needs but to contrast the less advanced men 
of science with the more advanced, to see that this process 
of making groups, which the first pursue with but little 
perception of its ultimate use, is pursued by the last with 
clear ideas of its value as a means of achieving higher 
objects. 

So too is it with nomenclatures. Few will hesitate to 
admit that in the first stages of language, things were 
named incidentally—not from a recognition of the value 
of names as facilitating communication; but under the 
pressure of particular ideas which it was desired to con¬ 
vey. The poverty of aboriginal tongues, which contain 
words only for the commonest and most conspicuous 
objects, serves of itself to show, that systems of verbal 
signs were, in the beginning, unconsciously extended as 


6 


AN ELEMENT IN METHOD. 


far only as necessity impelled. Now, however, nomen¬ 
clatures are made intentionally. A new star, a new 
island, a new mineral, a new plant or animal, are sever¬ 
ally named by their discoverers as soon as found; and 
are so named with more or less comprehension of the 
purpose which names subserve. Moreover it may be 
remarked that whereas, in the primitive unconscious 
process of naming, the symbols employed were, as 
far as might he, descriptive of the things signified; so, 
in our artificial systems of names—and especially in 
our chemical one—a descriptive character has been 
designedly given. Add to which, that whereas there 
spontaneously grew up in natural nomenclatures, cer¬ 
tain habitual ways of combining and inflecting names 
to indicate composite and modified objects; so, in 
the nomenclatures of science, systematic modes of 
forming compound names have been consciously 
adopted. 

Again, a similar progress may be traced in the mak¬ 
ing of inductions. As is now commonly acknowledged, 
all general truths are either immediately or mediately 
inductive—are either themselves derived from aggrega¬ 
tions of observed facts, or are deduced from truths that 
are so derived. The grouping together of the like co¬ 
existences and sequences presented by experience, and 
the formation of a belief that future coexistences and se¬ 
quences will resemble past ones, is the common type of 
all initial inferences, whether they be those of the infant 
or the philosopher. Up to the time of the Greeks, man¬ 
kind had pursued this process of forming conclusions, 
unknowingly, as the mass of them pursue it still. Aris¬ 
totle recognized the fact that certain classes of conclu¬ 
sions were thus formed; and to some extent taught the 


AN ELEMENT IN METHOD. 


7 


necessity of so forming them. But it was not until Bacon 
lived, that the generalization of experiences was erected 
into a method. Now, however, that all educated men are 
in a sense Bacon’s disciples, we may daily see followed 
out systematically, and with design, in the investigations 
of science, those same mental operations which mankind 
at large have all along unwittingly gone through, in 
gaining their commonest knowledge of surrounding 
things. And further, in the valuable “ System of Logic ” 
of John Mill, we have now exhibited to us in an organ¬ 
ized form, those more complex intellectual procedures 
which acute thinkers have ever employed, to some ex¬ 
tent, in verifying the aboriginal inductive process—pro¬ 
cedures which the most advanced inquirers are now be¬ 
ginning to employ with premeditation, and with a recog¬ 
nition of their nature and their purpose. 

Another illustration may be drawn from the first part 
of this work. On reconsidering the chapter treating of 
the Universal Postulate, it will be seen that the canon of 
.belief there enunciated as the one to be used in testing 
every premiss, every step in an argument, every conclu¬ 
sion, is one which men have from the beginning used to 
these ends; that beliefs which are proved by the incon¬ 
ceivableness of their negations to invariably exist, men 
have, of necessity, always held to be true, though they 
have not knowingly done this; and that the step remain¬ 
ing to be taken, was simply to apply this test consciously 
and systematically. It will also be seen that the like may 
be said of the second canon of belief contained in that 
chapter; viz. that the certainty of any conclusion is 
great, in proportion as the assumptions of the Universal 
Postulate made in reaching it are few. For as was 
pointed out people in general habitually show but little 


8 


AN ELEMENT IN METHOD. 


confidence in results reached by elaborate calculations, 
or by long chains of reasoning; whilst they habitually 
show the greatest confidence in results reached by direct 
perception; and these contrasted classes of results are 
those which respectively presuppose very many and very 
few assumptions of the Universal Postulate. In this case 
therefore, as in the other, the rational criterion is simply 
the popular criterion analyzed, systematized, and applied 
with premeditation. 

In further exemplification of this law I might en¬ 
large upon the fact, that having found habit to generate 
facility, we intentionally habituate ourselves to those 
acts in which facility is desired; upon the fact, that hav¬ 
ing seen how the mind masters its problems by proceed¬ 
ing from the simple to the complex, we now consciously 
pursue our scientific inquiries in the same order; upon 
the fact, that having, in our social operations, spontane¬ 
ously fallen into division of labour, we now, in any new 
undertaking, introduce division of labour intentionally. 
But without multiplying illustrations, it will by this time 
he sufficiently clear, that, as above said, not only be¬ 
tween the so-called instinctive processes and rational 
ones, is there a difference in respect of the consciousness 
with which they are performed, but there are analogous 
differences between the successive gradations of ration¬ 
ality itself. 

Are we not here then, led to a general doctrine of 
methods? In each of the cases cited, we see an arranged 
course of action deliberately pursued with a view to spe¬ 
cial ends—a method; and on inquiring how one of these 
methods differs from any conscious intelligent procedure 
not dignified by the title, we find that it differs only in 
length and complication. Neglecting this distinction as 


AN ELEMENT IN METHOD. 


9 


a merely conventional one—ceasing to regard methods 
objectively, as written down in hooks, and regarding 
them subjectively, as elaborate modes of operation by 
which the mind reaches certain results—we shall see, 
that they may properly be considered as the highest self- 
conscious manifestations of the rational faculty. And if, 
viewed analytically, all methods are simply complex in¬ 
tellectual processes, standing towards conscious reasoning 
much as conscious reasoning stands towards unconscious 
reasoning, and as unconscious reasoning stands towards 
processes lower in the scale—if further, in the several in¬ 
stances above given, methods arose by the systematiza¬ 
tion and deliberate carrying‘out of mental operations 
which were before irregularly and unwittingly pursued 
—may we not fairly infer that all methods arise after 
this manner? That they become methods, when the 
processes they embody have been so frequently repeated 
as to assume an organized form? And that it is the fre¬ 
quent repetition, which serves alike to give them definite¬ 
ness, and to attract consciousness to them as processes by 
which certain ends have been achieved. Is it not indeed 
obvious, d priori , that no method can be practicable to 
the intellect save one which harmonizes with its pre- 
established modes of action? Is it not obvious that the 
conception of a method by its promulgator implies in the 
experiences of his own mind, cases in which he has suc¬ 
cessfully followed such method? Is it not obvious that 
the advance he makes, consists in observing the processes 
through which his mind passed on those occasions, and 
generalizing and arranging them into a system? And is 
it not then obvious that, both in respect of origin and 
applicability, no method is possible but such as consists 
of an orderly and habitual use of the procedures which 


10 


AN ELEMENT IN METHOD. 


the intellect spontaneously pursues, but pursues fitfully, 
incompletely, and unconsciously? The answers can 
scarcely be doubtful. 

By thus carrying consciousness a stage higher, and 
recognizing the method by which methods are evolved, 
we may perhaps see our way to further devices in aid of , 
scientific inquiry. As in the case of deductive logic, and 
classification, and nomenclature, and induction, and the 
rest, it happened that by becoming conscious of the mode 
in which the mind wrought in these directions, men were 
enabled to organize its workings, and consequently to 
reach results previously unattainable; so, it is possible 
that by becoming conscious of the method by which 
methods are formed, we may be assisted in our search 
after further methods. If in the instances given, the 
method of forming methods was that of observing the 
operations by which from time to time the mind spon¬ 
taneously achieved its ends, and arranging these into a 
general scheme of action to be constantly followed in 
analogous cases; then, in whatever directions our modes 
of inquiry are at present unmethodized, our policy must 
be to trace the steps by which success is occasionally 
achieved in these directions; in the hope that by so 
doing, we may be enabled to frame systems of procedure 
which shall render future successes more or less sure. 
That there is scope for this cannot be doubted. On re¬ 
membering how much, even of the best thinking, is done 
in an irregular way; how little of the whole chain of 
thought by which a discovery is made, is included in the 
bare logical processes; and how unorganized is the part 
not so included; it will be manifest that there are intel¬ 
lectual operations still remaining to be methodized. And 
here may fitly be introduced an example, to which, in 


AN ELEMENT IN METHOD. 


11 


fact, the foregoing considerations are in a manner intro¬ 
ductory. 

Every generalization is at first an hypothesis. In 
seeking out the law of any class of phenomena, it is need¬ 
ful to make assumptions respecting it, and then to gather 
evidence to prove the truth or untruth of the assump¬ 
tions. The most rigorous adherent of the inductive 
method, cannot dispense with such assumptions; seeing 
that without them, he can neither know what facts to 
look for, nor how to interrogate such facts as he may 
have. Hypotheses, then, being the indispensable step¬ 
ping-stones to generalizations—every generalization hav¬ 
ing to pass through the hypothetic stage—it becomes 
a question whether there exists any mode of guiding our¬ 
selves towards true hypotheses. At present, hypotheses 
are chosen unsystematically—are suggested by cursory 
inspections of the phenomena; and the seizing of right 
ones, seems, in the great majority of cases, a matter of 
accident. May we not infer however, from the peculiar 
skill which some men have displayed in the selection of 
true hypotheses, that there is a special kind of intellec¬ 
tual action by which they are distinguishable. To call 
the faculty shown by such men, genius, or intuition, is 
merely to elude the question. If mental phenomena con¬ 
form to fixed laws, then, an unusual skill in choosing true 
hypotheses, means nothing else than an unusual tendency 
to pursue that mental process by which true hypotheses 
are reached; and this implies that such a process exists. 

To identify this process is the problem: to find how, 
when seeking the law of any group of phenomena, we 
may make a probable assumption respecting them—how 
we may guide ourselves to a point of view from which 
the facts to be generalized can he seen in their funda- 


AN ELEMENT IN METHOD. 


12 

mental relations. Evidently, as the thing wanted is al¬ 
ways an unknown thing, the only possible guidance must 
he that arising from a foreknowledge of whereabouts it 
is to be found, or of its general aspect, or of both. If all 
f true generalizations (excluding the merely empirical 
ones) should possess a peculiarity in common; and this 
peculiarity should be one not difficult of recognition, the 
desired guidance may be had. That such a peculiarity 
exists, will by this time have been inferred; and it now 
remains to inquire what it is. 

Most are familiar with the observation, that viewed 
in one of its chief aspects, scientific progress is constantly 
towards larger and larger generalizations—towards gen¬ 
eralizations, that is, which include the generalizations 
previously established. Further, the remark has been 
made, that every true generalization commonly affords 
an explanation of some other series of facts than the 
series out of the investigation of which it originated. In 
both of which propositions we have partial statements of 
the truth, that each onward step in science is achieved 
when a group of phenomena to be generalized is brought 
under the same generalization with some connate group 
previously considered separate. Let us look at a few 
cases. 

In the Calculus it was thus, when the relationships 
of extension, linear, superficial, and solid, were found to 
conform to the same law with those of numbers that are 
multiplied into each other; and again, when numbers 
themselves, whether representing spaces, forces, times, 
objects, or what not, were found to possess certain gen¬ 
eral properties, capable of being expressed algebraically, 
which remain the same whatever the magnitudes of the 
numbers. In Mechanics it was thus, when a formula 


AN ELEMENT IN METHOD. 


13 


was discovered which brought the equilibrium of the 
scales, under the same generalization with the equi¬ 
librium of the lever with unequal arms: and again, when 
the discovery that fluids press equally in all directions, 
afforded explanations, alike of their uniform tendency 
towards horizontality, and of their power to support float¬ 
ing bodies. Thus too was it in Astronomy, when the 
apparently erratic movements of the planets, and the 
comparatively regular movement of the moon, were ex¬ 
plained as both due to similar revolutions; and when the 
celestial motions, and the falling of rain-drops, were ex¬ 
plained as different manifestations of the same force. 
It was thus in Optics, when the composite nature of light 
was discovered to be the passive cause of the prismatic 
spectrum, of the rainbow, and of the colours of objects; 
in Thermotics, when the expansion of mercury, the ris¬ 
ing of smoke, and the boiling of water, were recognized 
as different manifestations of the same law of expansion 
by heat; in Acoustics, when the doctrine of undulations 
was found to apply equally to the phenomena of har¬ 
monies, of discords, of pulses, of sympathetic vibrations. 
Similarly, it was thus in Chemistry, when the burning 
of coal, the rusting of iron, and the wasting away of 
starved animals, were generalized as instances of oxida¬ 
tion. It was thus, too, when the electro-positive and 
electro-negative relations of the elements, were brought 
in elucidation of their chemical affinities. And once 
more it was thus, when, by the investigations of Oersted 
and Ampere, the phenomena of Electricity and Mag¬ 
netism were reduced to the same category; and the be¬ 
haviour of the magnetic needle was assimilated to that 
of a needle subjected to the influence of artificial elec¬ 
tric currents. 


14 


AN ELEMENT IN METHOD. 


Now this circumstance, that a true generalization 
usually brings within one formula groups of phenomena 
which at first sight seem unallied, is itself a more or 
less reliable index of the truth of a generalization. For 
manifestly, to have found for any series of facts, a law 
which equally applies to some apparently distinct series, 
implies that we have laid hold of a truth more general 
than the truths presented by either series regarded sepa¬ 
rately—more general than the truths which give the 
special character to either series. If, in the instances 
above cited, and in hosts of others, we find that the 
most general fact displayed by any class of phenomena, 
is also the most general fact displayed by another class, 
or by several other classes; then, we may conversely 
infer, on finding a general fact to be true of several 
eases in each of two separate classes, that there is consid¬ 
erable probability of its being true of all the cases in 
each class. Or, to exhibit the proposition in another 
form:—A peculiarity observed to be common to cases 
that are widely distinct, is more likely to be a funda¬ 
mental peculiarity, than one which is observed to be 
common to cases that are nearly related. 

Hence, then, is deducible a method of guiding our¬ 
selves towards true hypotheses. For if a characteristic 
seen equally in instances usually placed in different 
categories, is more likely to be a general characteristic 
than one seen equally in instances belonging to the same 
category; then, it is obviously our policy, when seeking 
the most general characteristic of any category, not to 
compare the instances contained in it with each other, 
but to compare them with instances contained in some 
allied category. We must seek out all the categories 
with which alliance is probable; compare some of the 


PROFESSOR CAIRNES’S CRITICISMS. 


15 


phenomena included in each with some of the phenom¬ 
ena under investigation; ascertain by each comparison 
what there is common to both kinds; and then, if there 
be any characteristic common to both, inquire whether 
it is common to all the phenomena we are aiming to 
generalize: in doing which we may with advantage still 
act out the same principle, by comparing first the cases 
that are most strongly contrasted. The adoption of this 
course secures two advantages. Not only must any pe¬ 
culiarity which may be hit upon, as common to phe¬ 
nomena of separate classes, have a greater probability of 
being a generic peculiarity, than any one of the many 
peculiarities possessed in common by phenomena of the 
same classes; but further, we shall be more likely to ob¬ 
serve all that there is in common between diverse phe¬ 
nomena placed side by side, than we shall to observe all 
that there is in common between phenomena so much 
alike as to be classed together. Fewer hypotheses are 
possible; all that are possible are likely to be thought 
of; and of those thought of, each has a much higher 
chance of being true. 


PEOFESSOE CAIENES’S CEITICISMS. 

Prof. Cairnes having, in The Fortnightly Review 
for January and February 1875, criticized my views 
concerning social evolution and its relations to individ¬ 
ual volitions and activities, I published in the February 
number the following reply, which, by the Editor’s 
courtesy, I was allowed to append to Prof. Cairnes’s con- 


16 


PROFESSOR CAIRNES’S CRITICISMS. 


eluding article. The prevalence of the error into which 
Prof. Cairnes fell, makes desirable the reproduction of 
this explanation excluding it. 

Were it possible to expound clearly, in one small 
volume, a doctrine which three large volumes are to be 
occupied in expounding, it would be needless to write 
the three large volumes. Further, in a work on the 
study of a science devoted to the discussion of difficulties 
and preparations, and referring to its facts and infer¬ 
ences mainly in elucidation of the study, it is hardly to 
be expected that the principles of the science can be set 
forth with the exactness and the qualifications proper 
to a work on the science itself; indications and outline 
statements only are to be looked for. 

I say this by way of implying that the objections 
raised by Prof. Cairnes to views incidentally sketched 
in the Study of Sociology , will be adequately met by the 
full exposition which the Principles of Sociology is to 
contain. This exposition will, I believe, satisfy Prof. 
Cairnes that he does not quite rightly apprehend the 
general doctrine of evolution, and the doctrine of social 
evolution forming part of it. For example, so far is it 
from being true, as he supposes, that the existence of 
stationary societies is at variance with the doctrine, it is, 
contrariwise, a part of the doctrine that a stationary 
state, earlier or later reached, is one towards which all 
evolutional changes, social or other, inevitably lead. 
(See First Principles , chap. XXII, “ Equilibration.”) 
And again, so far is it from being true that the slow 
social decays which in some cases take place, and the dis¬ 
solutions which take place in others, are incongruous 


PROFESSOR CAIRNES’S CRITICISMS. 


w 

with the doctrine, it is, contrariwise, a part of it that 
decays and dissolutions must come in all cases. (See 
First Principles , chap. XXIII, “ Dissolution.”) 

Leaving the rest of Prof. Cairnes’s objections to be 
answered by implication in the volumes which I hope 
in time to complete, I will here say no more than may 
suffice to remove the impression that I advocate passivity 
in public affairs. From the principles laid down, he con¬ 
siders me bound to accept the absurd corollary that 
political organization is superfluous. To recall his illus¬ 
tration of insurance against fire, he argues that since 
loss by fire is not diminished by insurance companies, 
but only re-distributed, I must, in pursuance of my ar¬ 
gument, hold that insurance companies are useless! The 
passage which Prof. Cairnes quotes is directed against 
“ the current illusion that social evils admit of radical 
cures,” in immediate ways; and insists “ that the ques¬ 
tion in any case is whether re-distribution, even if prac¬ 
ticable, is desirable: ” the obvious implication being that 
some re-distributions are desirable and some not. 

I am chiefly concerned, however, to repudiate the 
conclusion that “ the private action of citizens ” is need¬ 
less or unimportant, because the course of social evolu¬ 
tion is determined by the natures of citizens, as working 
under the conditions in which they are placed. To assert 
that each social change is thus determined, is to assert 
that all the egoistic and altruistic activities of citizens 
are factors of the change; and is tacitly to assert that in 
the absence of any of these—say political aspirations, 
or the promptings of philanthropy—The change will not 
be the same. So far from implying that the efforts of 
each man to achieve that which he thinks best, are un¬ 
important, the doctrine implies that such efforts, sever- 


18 


PROFESSOR CAIRNES’S CRITICISMS. 


ally resulting from the natures of the individuals, are 
indispensable forces. The correlative duty is thus em¬ 
phasized in § 34 of First Principles :— 

“ It is not for nothing that he has in him these sym¬ 
pathies with some principles and repugnance to others. 
He, with all his capacities, and aspirations, and beliefs, 
is not an accident, but a product of the time. He must 
remember that while he is a descendant of the past, he 
is a parent of the future; and that his thoughts are as 
children born to him, which he may not carelessly let 
die. He, like every other man, may properly consider 
himself as one of the myriad agencies through whom 
works the Unknown Cause; and when the Unknown 
Cause produces in him a certain belief, he is thereby 
authorized to profess and act out that belief. For, to 
render in their highest sense the words of the poet,— 

“ e . . . Nature is made better by no mean, 

But nature makes that mean: over that art 
Which you say adds to nature, is an art 
That nature makes.’ ” 

That there is no retreating from this view in the 
work Prof. Cairnes criticizes, is sufficiently shown by 
its closing paragraph:— 

“ Thus, admitting that for the fanatic some wild an¬ 
ticipation is needful as a stimulus, and recognizing the 
usefulness of his delusion as adapted to his particular 
nature and his particular function, the man of higher 
type must be content with greatly-moderated expecta¬ 
tions, while he perseveres with undiminished efforts. 
He has to see how comparatively little can be done, and 
yet to find it worth while to do that little: so uniting 
philanthropic energy with philosophic calm.” 

I do not see how Prof. Cairnes reconciles with such 
passages, his statement that “ according to Mr. Spencer, 


VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 


19 


the future of the human race may be safely trusted to 
the action of motives of a private and personal kind— 
to motives such as operate in the production and distri¬ 
bution of wealth, or in the development of language.” 
This statement is to the effect that I ignore the “ action 
of motives ” of a higher kind; whereas these are not only 
necessarily included by me in the totality of motives, 
but repeatedly insisted upon as all-essential factors. I 
am the more surprised at this misapprehension, because, 
in the essay on “ Specialized Administration,” to which 
Prof. Cairnes refers (see Fortnightly Review , for De¬ 
cember, 1871), I have dwelt at considerable length on 
the altruistic sentiments and the resulting social activi¬ 
ties, as not having been duly taken into account by Prof. 
Huxley. 

As Prof. Cairnes indicates at the close of his first 
paper, the difficulty lies in recognizing human actions 
as, under one aspect, voluntary, and under another pre¬ 
determined. I have said elsewhere all I have to say on 
this point. Here I wish only to point out that the con¬ 
clusion he draws from my premises is utterly different 
from the conclusion I draw. Entering this caveat, I 
must leave all further elucidations to come in due course. 


VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 

In 1877 a Royal Commission sat to take evidence on 
the general question of Copyright, and I was invited to 
give evidence. The following result is reproduced from 
the official “ Minutes of Evidence ” given on March 6 


20 


VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 


and March 20, 1877. On a subsequent occasion (May, 
1881), at a meeting of the National Association for the 
Promotion of Social Science, I expressed some further 
views, which were published in vol. XIV of the society’s 
Proceedings. 

{Chairman.) I need hardly ask, you are a writer of 
philosophical and scientific books?—I am. 

Would you give the Commission your experience of 
the terms on which you published your first book?—I 
published my first work, “ Social Statics,” at the end of 
1850. Being a philosophical book it was not possible to 
obtain a publisher who would undertake any responsi¬ 
bility, and I published it at my own cost. A publisher 
looks askance at philosophy, and especially the philoso¬ 
phy of a new man; hence I published on commission. 

Would you like to state what the result was?—The 
edition was 750; it took 14 years to sell. 

Then with respect to your next work?—In 1855 I 
published the “ Principles of Psychology”; I again 
tried in vain to get a publisher, and published again at 
my own cost. There were 750 copies, and the sale was 
very slow. I gave away a considerable number, and the 
remainder, I suppose about 650, sold in 12 J years. 

Have you had any other similar cases?—Yes; I 
afterwards, in 1857, published a series of Essays, and, 
warned by past results, I printed only 500. That took 
10-| years to sell. After that a second series of Essays, 
and a little work on Education, which both had kindred 
results, but were not quite so long in selling. I should 
add that all these sales would have taken still longer but 
for the effect produced upon them by books published 



VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 21 

' at a later period, which helped the earlier ones to 
i sell. 

Have all these subsequent works to which you now 
refer been published in the same way?—No. Towards 
1860 I began to be anxious to publish a “ System of Phi¬ 
losophy,” which I had been elaborating for a good many 
years. I found myself in the position of losing by all 
my books; and after considering various plans, I decided 
upon the plan of issuing to subscribers in quarterly parts, 
and to the public in volumes when completed. Before 
the initial volume, “ First Principles,” was finished, I 
found myself still losing. During issue of the second 
volume, the “ Principles of Biology,” I was still losing. 
In the middle of the third volume I was still losing so 
much that I found I was frittering away all I possessed. 
I went back upon my accounts, and found that in the 
course of 15 years I had lost nearly 1,200Z.—adding in- 
t terest, more than 1,200Z.; and as I was evidently going 
I on ruining myself, I issued to the subscribers a notice 
of cessation. 

Was that loss the difference between the money that 
you had actually spent in publishing the books and the 
money you had received in return?—Not exactly. The 
difference was between my total expenditure in publish¬ 
ing the books and living in the most economical way 
possible, and the total returns. That is to say, cutting 
down my expenses to the smallest amount, I lost 1,200Z. 
by the inadequate returns, and trenched to that extent 
upon capital. 

But you continued afterwards, did you not, to pub¬ 
lish?—I continued afterwards, simply, I may say, by 
accident. On two previous occasions, in the course of 
these 15 years, I had been enabled to persevere, spite of 




22 


VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 


losses, by bequests. On this third occasion, after the 
issue of the notice, property which I inherit came to me 
in time to prevent the cessation. 

May I ask how long it took before you began to be 
repaid for your losses?—My losses did not continue very j 
long after that: the tide turned and my books began to 
pay. I have calculated what length of time it has taken 
to repay my losses, and find they were repaid in 1874; 
that is to say, in 24 years after I began I retrieved my 
position. 

Then the Commission understand that your books are j 
now remunerative?—They are now remunerative, and 
for this reason:—As I have explained, I had to publish 
on commission. Commission is a system which, throw- | 
ing all the cost upon the author, is very disastrous for 
him if his books do not pay, and, as you see in this case, 
has been very disastrous to me; but when they do pay it 
is extremely advantageous, inasmuch as in that case the j 
publisher who does the business takes only 10 per cent., 
and the whole of the difference between cost and pro¬ 
ceeds, minus that 10 per cent., comes to the author. I 
have calculated what are my actual returns, on two sup¬ 
positions. I have ascertained the percentage I get upon 
1,000 copies, supposing that I set up the type solely for 
that 1,000 copies—supposing, that is, that the cost of 
composition comes into the cost. In that case I reap 
3Of per cent. But I reap much more. I was sanguine j 
enough, when I began this series of books, to stereotype. 
The result is that now I simply have to print additional 
thousands as they are demanded. If I suppose the cost j 
of composition and stereotyping to have been paid for 
the first edition, and only estimate the cost of paper and 
printing in the successive editions, then I am reaping 



VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 


23 


44 f per cent. The actual percentage, of course, is one 
which lies between those two; but year by year, with 
each additional thousand, I approach more nearly to the 
limit of 41J per cent. I should point out that the result 
of this is that I receive, as may be supposed, a consider¬ 
able return upon the moderate numbers sold. * 

And that being so, can you tell the Commission what 
in your opinion would have happened had there been in 
existence a system under which three years, say, after 
date of publication anyone could have reprinted your 
books, paying you a royalty of 10 per cent.?—The result 
would have been that my losses would not have been 
repaid now. After 26 years’ work I should still have 
been out of pocket; and should be out of pocket for 
many years to come. 

(Mr. Trollope.) Under such a system do you think 
that you would ever have recovered that money?—I am 
taking it on the most favourable supposition, merely 
supposing that all other things but the percentage had 
remained the same. 

(Chairman.) Assuming the system of royalty to be 
in existence, what would be the result on your present 
returns, supposing losses to have been repaid?—Between 
two thirds and three fourths of those returns would be 
cut off. They would be reduced to little more than a 
fourth of their present amount. 

(Sir H. Holland.) How do you arrive at that result? 
—By comparing the supposed percentage with the per¬ 
centage I actually receive. 

Assuming a royalty of 10 per cent, upon the retail 
price?—Yes. 

(Chairman.) Would it not be probable that the re¬ 
duction in price of your books would so increase the sales 


24- VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 

that you would reap a larger return than you have sup¬ 
posed in the estimate that you have now given?—I think 
not, or very little. First of all for the reason that the 
amount of reduction would not he anything like so great 
as at first sight appears. If a publisher issued rival edi¬ 
tions of my books without my assent, on paying a roy¬ 
alty, he would only do so to make a profit beyond that 
which mere commission would bring. My present pub¬ 
lisher is content with 10 per cent, commission. A pub¬ 
lisher who competed as a speculation would want to make 
his profit beyond the 10 per cent, commission: as I as¬ 
certain, probably, at least a further 10 per cent. Then 
there would be my own 10 per cent, royalty. So that 
I find the reduction in price under such a royalty system 
would only be about 15 per cent. That is to say, the 
reduction would be from 20s. to 17s. How I am of 
opinion that a reduction of the price of one of my books 
by that amount would have but a small effect upon the 
sales, the market being so limited. Let me use an illus¬ 
tration. Take such a commodity as cod-liver oil, which 
is a very necessary thing for a certain limited class. Sup¬ 
pose it is contended that, out of regard for those to whom 
it is so necessary, retailers should be compelled to take 
a smaller profit, and you reduce the price by 15 per cent. 
The consumption would be very little influenced, be¬ 
cause there would be none except those who had it pre- 
| scribed for them who would be willing to take it, and 
they must have it. How take one of my books, say the 
“ Principles of Psychology.” Instead of calling it 
“ caviare to the general,” let us call it cod-liver oil to the 
general: I think it probable that if you were to ask 99' 
people out of 100 whether they would daily take a spoon¬ 
ful of cod-liver oil or read a chapter of that book, they 




VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 


'25 


would, prefer the cod-liver oil. And if so it is quite 
clear, I think, that no lowering of the price by 3s. out 
of 20s. would in any considerable degree increase the 
number of persons who bought the “ Principles of Psy¬ 
chology.” The class is so limited and so special that 
there would be no increase of profit of a considerable 
kind in consequence of an increased number sold. 

(Mr. Trollope .) But are there not many people who 
would have benefited by cod-liver oil who cannot get it 
at present because of the price?—I think in all those 
cases in which they would be benefited they get it by 
hook or by crook when it is prescribed for them. 

And in the same way with your books you think?—- 
Yes. For instance, university men have to read them, 
and they would buy them in any case. 

(i Chairman .) What would have happened to you 
originally had there been a law giving a copyright only 
of short duration, under such an arrangement of per¬ 
centage as that which you have just named?—I think 
it is tolerably obvious, from what I have already said, 
that I should not have been wholly deterred. I should 
have gone on losing for many years; but I think it is 
also clear that I should have stopped short much sooner 
than I did. Every author is naturally sanguine about 
his books: he has hopes which nobody else entertains. 
The result is that he will persevere, in the hope of at 
some time or other reaping some return, when to other 
persons there seems to be no probability of the kind. 
But supposing it becomes manifest to him that the copy¬ 
right law is such that when his books succeed, if they 
ever do succeed, he will not get large profits, then the 
discouragement will be much greater, and he will stop 
much sooner. If I, for instance, instead of seeing that 
3 



26 


VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 


under the system of commission I should eventually, if 
I succeeded, repay myself and get a good return, had 
seen that eventually, if I succeeded, I should receive but 
small gains, I should have given it up. 

Are there other publications which you have under¬ 
taken besides those to which you have already referred? 
—Yes. About 10 years ago I commenced preparing 
works now published under the name of u Descriptive 
Sociology,” in large folio parts, and containing tables 
and classified extracts representing the civilisations of 
various societies. I employed gentlemen to make these 
compilations. 

Do you wish to state what has been the result of that 
undertaking so far?—Yes. I made up my accounts last 
Christmas. I had then in the course of those 10 years 
-expended 2,958 1. odd upon eight parts (five published 
and three in hand), and my net return from sales of 
the five parts published in England and America was 
608Z. 10s. 

May I ask whether you ever expect to get back the 
.money you have expended?—I may possibly get back 
the printing expenses on the earliest part, and most popu¬ 
lar part, that dealing with the English civilization, in 
1880, at the present rate of sale. The printing expenses 
of the other parts I do not expect to get back for many 
years longer. The cost of compilation I expect to get 
back if I live to be over 100. 

(Mr. Daldy.) You spoke of the circulation in Eng¬ 
land and America. May I ask, Do you send stereotype 
plates to America?—I did at first send stereotype plates 
to America, but the thing having proved to be so great 
a loss I now send a portion of the printed edition. 

(Chairman.) May I ask why do you expect repay- 





VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 


2Y 


ment of the cost of compilation to be so slow as you 
stated in your answer to my last question?—The reason 
is that I made a promise to the compilers entailing that. 
The compilers are university men, to whom I could 
afford to give only such salaries as sufficed for their 
necessary expenses. To make the thing better for them, 
and to he some incentive, I told them that when the 
printing expenses on any one part were repaid, I would 
commence to divide with the compiler of it the returns 
of subsequent sales: the result being, that the cost of 
compilation comes back to me only at half the previous 
rate. I name this because it shows that in the absence 
of a long copyright, I could have given no such contin¬ 
gent advantage to the compilers. I wish to point out 
another way in which a short copyright would have im¬ 
peded me. As a further incentive to these compilers to 
do their work well, as also make the prospect better for 
them, I gave them to understand that the copyrights and 
the stereotype plates would be theirs after my death. Of 
course with a short copyright I could not have done that. 

Then in your opinion it is only by a long duration of 
copyright that you can be enabled to recover any con¬ 
siderable part of the money that you have sunk in these 
publications?—Certainly. If it were possible for anyone 
to reprint, such small return as goes towards diminish¬ 
ing this immense loss would be in part intercepted. 

But if this work, which you call “ Descriptive Soci¬ 
ology,” is so unremunerative, how do you imagine you 
would be in danger of having it reprinted under the 
suggested system of royalty?—It appears at first sight 
not a rational expectation, but it is perfectly possible. 
Each number of the work consists of a set of tables and 
a set of classified extracts. It was suggested by a re- 


28 


VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 


viewer of the first part, the English part, that the tables 
should be separately printed, mounted on boards, and 
hung up in schools. The suggestion was a good one, and 
I have even had thoughts of doing it myself. A pub¬ 
lisher might take up that suggestion, and might issue 
those independently of me, and diminish what small 
sale I now have. Again, the work is very cumbrous and 
awkward; that can hardly be helped; but a publisher 
might see that the extracts arranged in ordinary volume 
form would be valuable by themselves apart from the 
tables, and might get a good sale independently; and 
again my small returns would be cut into. 

(Sir H. Holland.) That objection of yours would 
be partly met by the suggestion of Mr. Macfie, who 
brought this question of royalty before us, because his 
suggestion is, that no reprint is to differ from the origi¬ 
nal edition without the author’s consent, either in the 
way of abbreviation, enlargement, or alteration of the 
text. Therefore, under that regulation, if that is carried 
out, a publisher could not print half of this book with* 
out your consent?—That would so far, if it can be prac¬ 
tically worked out, meet my objection. 

(Mr. Trollope.) But you have stated that you 
thought yourself of using this form of abridgment to 
which allusion is made?—I have. 

And if this form of abridgment when made by you 
could be republished again by anybody else, then your 
profit would be interfered with?—No doubt of it. > 

(Chairman.) Supposing the suggested system of 
short copyright and royalty had been in force, would 
you have undertaken these works to which you have re¬ 
ferred ?—Certainly not. The enterprise was an unprom¬ 
ising one, pecuniarily considered, and it would have been 




VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 


29 


almost an insane one, I think, had there not been the 
possibility of eventually getting back some returns from 
sales that were necessarily very slow. Moreover, the 
hopes under which the compilers have worked I could 
never have given to them. 

Then are we to gather from your evidence that the 
system of short copyright and royalty would be injurious 
to the books of the graver class which do not appeal to 
the popular tastes?—I think so; it would be especially 
injurious to that particular class which of all others 
needs encouragement. 

(Sir H. Holland.) As requiring most thought and 
brain work on the part of the author?—Yes, and being 
least remunerative. 

{Chairman.) I understand you to say that in all 
these cases you have not parted with the copyright your¬ 
self?—No, I have not. 

Now assuming that the authors of these graver books 
sold their copyrights, do you think this royalty system 
would still act prejudicially upon them?—I think very 
decidedly. I have understood that it is contended that 
authors who sell their copyrights would not be affected 
by this arrangement. One of the answers I heard given 
here to-day sufficed to show that that is not true; inas¬ 
much as a publisher who had to meet these risks would 
not give as much for copyright as he would otherwise 
give. His argument would be unanswerable. He would 
say, “ Your book is a success, or not a success; if not a 
success, I lose what I give you for copyright; if a suc¬ 
cess, I shall have it reprinted upon me, and again I shall 
lose what I give you for copyright. I must, therefore, 
reduce the amount which I give for the copyright.” 
Moreover, I believe that the reduction in the value of 


VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 


30 

copyright would be much greater than the facts justified. 
In the first place, the publisher himself would look to 
the possibility of reprinting with a fear beyond that 
which actual experience warranted. Frequently a sug¬ 
gested small danger acts upon the mind in a degree out 
of all proportion to its amount. Take such a case as the 
present small-pox epidemic, in which you find that one 
person in 30,000 dies in a week; in which, therefore, 
the risk of death is extremely small. Look at this actual 
risk of death and compare it with the alarms that you 
find prevailing amongst people. It is clear that the fear 
of an imagined consequence of that kind, is often much 
in excess of the actual danger. Similarly, I conceive that 
the publisher himself would unconsciously over-estimate 
the danger of reprints. But beyond that he would ex¬ 
aggerate his over-estimate as an excuse for beating dow T n 
copyright. He would say to the author, u You see this 
danger; I cannot face so great a risk without guarding 
myself; and you must submit to a large reduction.” 


The evidence as continued on March 20 was as follows: 

{Chairman.') I will ask you if you have any ex¬ 
planations you wish to offer on any point connected with 
the evidence which you gave on the last occasion?—Yes; 
I have to rectify some misapprehensions. From the re¬ 
statement made by Mr. Farrer, it would appear that in 
discussing the question of profits from re-publication of 
one of my works, I said I had “ found that no other pub¬ 
lisher would undertake the work without an additional 
profit of 10 per cent.,” which implies that I had endeav¬ 
oured to obtain another publisher. My meaning was 
that I ascertained that any other publisher who thought 



VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 


31 


of issuing a rival edition, would expect to make a profit 
of 10 per cent, beyond the 10 per cent, commission for 
doing the business. Further, I have to remark that the 
case I took as illustrating the improbability that I should 
obtain any considerable compensation from increased 
sales under the royalty system, was the case of one of 
my works only, the “ Principles of Psychology,” and in 
respect of this, I may admit that there would be little 
danger of a rival edition. But it is not so with others of 
my works—with the work on “ Education,” now in its 
fourth thousand; with “ First Principles,” now in its 
fourth thousand, and especially with the just-issued first 
volume of the “ Principles of Sociology.” These are now 
sufficiently in demand, and, especially the last, suffi¬ 
ciently popular in manner and matter, to make rival 
editions quite probable. 

Now, with respect to the stereotype plates, would 
they not enable you to exclude the rival edition of which 
you speak?—I think not. In the first place, the assump¬ 
tion that other publishers would be deterred from issuing 
rival editions by my stereotype plates, implies that other 
publishers would know I had them. I do not see how 
other publishers are to know it, until after I had myself 
printed new editions—even English publishers, and it 
is out of the question that colonial publishers should 
know it. Hence, therefore, the fact of my having stereo- 
type plates would not prevent such rival editions. Con¬ 
sequently these rival editions, making their appearance 
unawares, would compete with my existing stock, printed 
in a comparatively expensive style, and would oblige me 
either to sacrifice that stock, or to lower the price to one 
far less remunerative. Then, subsequently, there would 
not be the supposed ability to compete so advantageously 


32 


VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 


with editions published by others. An edition to be sold 
at a cheap rate must not be in large type, well spaced, 
and with ample* margins, but must be in small type, and 
much matter put into the page. Hence the existing 
stereotype plates, adapted for printing only books in a 
superior style, could not be used to print cheap books: 
the quantity of paper and the cost of printing would be 
much larger items than to one who arranged the matter 
fitly for a cheap edition. 

Then are we to gather that you do not think that 
from any such cheap edition you would derive a profit 
from the royalty compensating you for your loss?— 
Nothing like compensating. Although the sales of these 
more readable books I have instanced might be consider¬ 
ably increased, the increase could not be anything like 
as great as would be required to produce the return I now 
have. Even supposing the price of the rival edition were 
the same, which of course it would not be, the 10 per 
cent, royalty would bring in the same amount, only sup¬ 
posing four times the number were sold that I sell now; 
and as, by the hypothesis, the price of the volume, to get 
any such larger sale, must be much lower, the royalty 
would bring in so much the less. If, say, “ Eirst Prin¬ 
ciples ” were issued at half the present price, 8,000 would 
have to be sold instead of 1,000 to bring in by royalty 
the present returns. Such an increase of the sale would 
be out of the question; even one half of it would be im¬ 
probable, so that certainly one half of my returns would 
be lost. 

Have you any other personal experience that you 
wish to bring before the Commission to show that such 
a modification of the copyright law as you have been dis¬ 
cussing would be disadvantageous to literature of the 



VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 


33 


graver kind?—I think I have. “ First Principles ” was 
published in 1862, and in the course of some years the 
doctrine it contains underwent, in my mind, a consider¬ 
able further development, and I found it needful to re¬ 
organise the hook. I spent five months in doing this; 
cancelled a large number of stereotype plates; and was 
thus at considerable cost of time and money. As I have 
already pointed out, the work being now in its fourth 
thousand, has had a degree of success such that there 
might, under the proposed arrangement, very possibly 
have been a rival edition at the time I proposed to make 
these alterations. Had there been such a rival edition, 
this cost of re-organisation to me would have been more 
serious even than it was; since the difference between 
the original and the improved edition, adequately known 
only to those who bought the improved edition, would 
not have prevented the sale of the rival edition; and the 
sale of the improved edition would have greatly dimin¬ 
ished. In any case the errors of the first edition would 
have been more widely spread; and in the absence of 
ability to bear considerable loss, it would have been 
needful to let them go and become permanent. A kin¬ 
dred tendency of the arrest of improvements would 
occur with all scientific books and all books of the higher 
kind, treating of subjects in a state of growth. 

With the object of rendering useful books as accessi¬ 
ble as possible to the public, do you think that those 
engaged in their production and distribution should be 
restrained from making what might be called undue 
profits?—In answer to the first part of the question I 
hope to say something presently, showing that the ad¬ 
vantage of increased accessibility of books is by no means 
unqualified; since greater accessibility may be a mis- 


34 


VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 


chief, if it tells in favour of worthless books instead of 
valuable books. But passing this for the present, I 
would comment on the proposition, which I perceive has 
been made before the Commission, that it is desirable 
to secure for books “ the cheapest possible price consist¬ 
ent with a fair profit to those concerned.” I here ven¬ 
ture to draw a parallel. What is now thought so desir¬ 
able respecting books, was in old times thought desirable 
respecting food—“ the cheapest possible price consistent 
with a fair profit to those concerned.” And to secure 
this all-essential advantage, more peremptory, indeed, 
than that now to be secured, there were regulations of 
various kinds extending through centuries, alike in Eng¬ 
land and on the Continent,—forbidding of exports, re¬ 
moving of middlemen, punishing of forestalled. But I 
need hardly recall the fact that all these attempts to 
interfere with the ordinary course of trade failed, and 
after doing much mischief were abolished. The at¬ 
tempt to secure cheap books by legislative arrangements, 
seems to me nothing less than a return to the long-aban¬ 
doned system of trade regulations; and is allied to the 
fixing of rates of interest, of prices, of wages. In the 
past it was the greediness of money-lenders that had to 
be checked, or, as in France for many generations, the 
greediness of hotel-keepers; and now it appears to be the 
greediness of book-producers that needs checking. I 
do not see, however, any reason for believing that regu¬ 
lations made by law to secure cheap bread for the body 
having failed, there is likelihood of success for regula¬ 
tions aiming to secure cheap bread for the mind. 

Then do we understand you to mean that no analogy 
furnished by past experience in commercial affairs can 
be held to imply that the proposed royalty plan would 


VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 


35 


succeed?—I think that all the facts are against it. I 
find it stated in the evidence lately given that there has 
not been raised “ an insuperable objection in point of 
principle 77 to the plan of a royalty. If no such objection 
in point of principle has been raised, I think one may be 
raised; the objection, namely, that it is distinctly op¬ 
posed to the principles of free trade. One of the aims of 
the plan, as expressed in the words of the same witness, 
is the “ preservation of a fair profit to the author. 7 ’ Now, 
on the face of it, it seems to me that any proposal to se¬ 
cure fair profits by legislation, is entirely at variance with 
free trade principles, which imply that profits are to be 
determined by the ordinary course of business. But 
further, I would point out that if it is competent for the 
legislature to say what is a “ fair profit to the author, 77 I 
do not see why it is not competent for the legislature to 
say what is a fair profit to the publisher; indeed, I may 
say that it is not only as competent but much more com¬ 
petent. I take it to be impossible for the legislature to 
fix with anything like equity the profit of authors, if 
profit is to bear any relation to either skill or labour, as 
it should do; inasmuch as one author puts into a page of 
his book ten times as much skill as another, and, in 
other cases, ten times as much labour as another. Hence 
therefore, if they are to be paid at the same percentage 
on the price, there is no proportion in that case secured 
between the value of the labour and what they receive. 
Similarly, if we consider the number sold, the royalty 
which might afford ample return to an author who sold 
a popular book in large numbers would afford little re¬ 
turn to an author who produced a grave book selling in 
small numbers. Obviously then it is extremely difficult, 
and in fact impossible, for the legislature to fix an equita- 


36 


VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 


ble royalty; but it is by no means so difficult for the 
legislature to fix an equitable rate of profit for the pub¬ 
lisher. The function of the publisher is a comparatively 
mechanical and uniform function: the same practically 
for all books, the same for all publishers, and hence is a 
thing very much easier to estimate in respect of the pro¬ 
portion; and in fact we have the evidence that it can be 
fixed with something like fairness, inasmuch as publish¬ 
ers themselves voluntarily accept a 10 per cent, commis¬ 
sion. Hence, I say, not only does the carrying out of the 
principle imply that if, in pursuit of alleged public ad¬ 
vantage, the profit of the author should be fixed, then 
also should the profit of the publisher be fixed, but that 
it is much easier to do the last than to do the first. If 
so, then, it is competent for the legislature to go a step 
further. If there is to be a Government officer to issue 
royalty stamps, there may as well be a Government 
officer to whom a publisher shall take his printer’s bills, 
and who adding to these the trade allowances, authors’ 
10 per cent, royalty, and publishers’ 10 per cent, com¬ 
mission, shall tell him at what price he may advertise 
the book. This is the logical issue of the plan; and this 
is not free trade. 

(Sir H. Holland.) You will hardly contend that the 
system of royalty is less in accord with free trade than 
the existing system of monopoly; you will not carry it 
so far as that, will you?—I do not admit the propriety of 
the word “ monopoly.” 

Without using the word “ monopoly,” let me say, 
than the present system of copyright for a certain term 
of years?—I regard that as just as much coming within 
the limits of free trade as I hold the possession, or mo- 
nopoly, of any other kind of property to be consistent 


VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 


37 


with free trade. There are people who call the capitalist 
a monopolist: many working men do that. I do not 
think he is rightly so called; and similarly if it is alleged 
that the author’s claim to the product of his brain-work 
is a monopoly, I do not admit it to be a monopoly. I re¬ 
gard both the term “ free trade ” as applied to the unre¬ 
strained issue of rival editions, and the term “ monopo¬ 
ly ” as applied to the author’s copyright, as question¬ 
begging terms. 

Without saying what opinion I hold upon the point, 
and avoiding the use of the words “ monopoly ” and 
“ free trade,” I wish to know whether you think it most 
consistent with the doctrines of political economy, that 
every person should he able, upon payment, to publish a 
particular book, or that only one person should have it in 
his power to do so for a certain time?—Every person is 
allowed and perfectly free to publish a book on any sub¬ 
ject. An author has no monopoly of a subject. An au- 
. thor writes a novel; another man may write a novel. An 
author writes a book on geology; another man may write 
a book on geology. He no more monopolises the subject 
than any trader who buys raw material and shapes it into 
an article of trade is a monopolist. There is more raw 
material which another man may buy. The only thing 
that the author claims is, that part of the value of the 
article which has been given to it by his shaping process; 
which is what any artizan does. The way in which this 
position of authors is spoken as “ monopoly ” reminds 
me of the doctrine of Proudhon—“ Property is robbery.” 
You may give a stigma to a thing by attaching to it a 
name not in the least appropriate. 

(Mr. Trollope.) I understand your objection to a 
system of royalties to be this, that no possible quota that 


38 


VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 


could be fixed would be a just payment for all works?— 
That is one objection. There is no possibility of fixing 
one that would apply to all works, inasmuch as the thing 
paid for is an extremely variable thing, more variable 
than in almost any other occupation. 

I put that question to another witness before you, but 
I am afraid failed to make him understand me. I am 
therefore glad to have the answer from you in order that 
we may show (I think you will agree with me) that no 
special royalty specified by Act of Parliament could be 
just to poetry, and to the drama, and to fiction, and to 
science, and to history at the same time?—Quite so. I 
think it obvious, when it is put clearly, that it cannot 
be; and that is an all-essential objection. 

(Sir H. Holland.) Nor would it in your opinion be 
desirable that the question of determining what amount 
of royalty is proper in each case should be vested in some 
registrar or some single person?—It would make the 
matter still worse. It would be bad to vest it anywhere, 
but especially bad to vest it in any single official. 

(Chairman.) Are we to assume that you think the 
plan of a royalty to be at variance with the established 
principles of the science of political economy?—I think 
quite at variance with the principles of political economy. 
The proposal is to benefit the consumer of books by cheap¬ 
ening books. A measure effecting this will either change, 
or will not change, the returns of these engaged in pro¬ 
ducing books. That it will change them may be taken 
as certain: the chances are infinity to one against such 
a system leaving the returns as they are. What will the 
change be? Either to increase or decrease those returns. 
Is it said that by this regulation the returns to producers 
of books will be increased, and that they only require 


VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 


39 


forcing to issue cheaper editions, to reap greater profit 
themselves, at the same time that they benefit the public ? 
Then the proposition is that book-producers and distri¬ 
butors do not understand their business, but require to 
be instructed by the State how to carry it on more ad¬ 
vantageously. Few will, I think, deliberately assert this. 
There is, then, the other alternative: the returns will be 
decreased. At whose expense decreased,—printers’, au¬ 
thors’, or publisher’s? Not at the expense of the print¬ 
ers: competition keeps down their profits at the normal 
level. Scarcely at the cost of the authors; for abundant 
evidence has shown that, on the average, authors’ profits 
are extremely small. Were there no other motive for 
authorship than money-getting, there would be very few 
authors. Clearly, then, the reduction of returns is to be 
at the cost of the publisher. The assumption is that for 
some reason or other, the publishing business, unlike any 
other business, needs its returns regulated by law. 
Thinking, apparently, of prosperous publishers only, and 
forgetting that there are many who make but moderate 
incomes and very many who fail, and thinking only of 
books which sell largely, while forgetting that very many 
books bring no profits and still more entail loss, it is 
assumed that the publishing business, notwithtanding 
the competition among publishers, is abnormally profit¬ 
able. This seems to me a remarkable assumption. Em¬ 
barking in the business of publishing, like embarking 
in any other business, is determined partly by the relative 
attractiveness of the occupation and partly by the prom¬ 
ised returns of capital. There is no reason to think that 
the occupation of publishing differs widely from other 
occupations in attractiveness; and hence we must say 
that, competing for recruits with many other businesses, 


40 


VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 


it must on the average, offer a like return on capital. 
Were it found that the average return on capital in pub¬ 
lishing was larger than in other businesses, there would 
immediately be more publishers; and competition would 
lower the returns. If, then, we must infer that, taking 
the returns of all publishers on the average of books, their 
profits are not higher than those of other businesses; 
what would be the effect of such a measure as that pro¬ 
posed, if, as anticipated, it lowered published returns? 
Simply that it would drive away a certain amount of 
capital out of the publishing business into more remuner¬ 
ative businesses. Competition among publishers would 
decrease; and as competition decreased, their profits 
would begin to rise again, until, by and bye, after a suf¬ 
ficient amount of perturbation and bankruptcy, there 
would be a return to the ordinary rates of profit on capi¬ 
tal, and the proposed benefit to the public at the cost of 
publishers would disappear. 

Then, with a view to the permanent cheapening of 
books, we may gather that your opinion is that it would 
not be effected in the way suggested ?—I think not. The 
natural cheapening of books is beneficial; the artificial 
cheapening mischievous. 

May I ask you to explain what you mean by contrast¬ 
ing the natural and the artificial cheapening of books?— 
By natural cheapening I mean that lowering of prices 
which follows increase of demand. I see no reason, a 
priori, for supposing that publishers differ from other 
traders in their readiness to cater for a larger public, if 
they see their way to making a profit by so doing; and, 
a posteriori, there is abundant proof that they do this. 
The various series of cheap books, bringing down even 
the whole of Shakespeare to a shilling, and all Byron to 


VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 


41 


a shilling, and each of Scott’s novels to sixpence, suffi¬ 
ciently prove that prices will be lowered in the publish¬ 
ing trade if the market is adequately extensive, just as 
in any other trade. If it be said that in this case authors 
have not to be paid, I would simply refer to such a series 
as that of Mr. Bohn, who, notwithstanding the payments 
to translators and others, published numerous valuable 
books at low rates. Moreover, we have conclusive evi¬ 
dence that with the works of still-living authors the same 
thing happens, when the market becomes sufficiently 
large to make a low price profitable. Witness not only 
the cheap editions of many modern novels, but the cheap 
editions even of Mr. Carlyle’s works, and Mr. Mill’3 
works. Deductively and inductively, then, we may say 
that there is a natural cheapening of books, going as far 
as trade profits allow; as there is a natural cheapening of 
other things. Conversely, I mean by artificial cheapen¬ 
ing, that kind which is anticipated from the measure pro¬ 
posed; for it is expected by means of this measure to 
make publishers issue books at lower rates than they other¬ 
wise do. And this is essentially a proposal to make them 
publish at a relative loss. If, as already argued, the 
average rates of publishers’ profits are not above those of 
ordinary business-profits, these measures for lowering 
their prices, must either drive them out of the business 
or be inoperative. To put the point briefly—if there is 
an obvious profit to be obtained, publishers will lower 
their prices of their own accord; and the proposed com¬ 
petitive system will not make profits obvious where they 
were not so before. 

But if there was free competition on the payment of 
the author’s royalty, might it not be that another publish¬ 
er would be led to issue a cheap edition when the original 

4 


42 


VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 


publisher would not?—I see no reason to think this. 
The assumption appears to be that everybody but author 
and original publisher can see the advantage of a cheap 
edition, but that author and original publisher are blind. 
Contrariwise, it seems to me that the original producers 
of the book are those best enabled to say when a cheap , 
edition will answer. The original producers of the book 
know all the data—number sold, cost, return, and so 
forth; and can judge of the probable demand. Another 
publisher is in the dark, and it does not seem a reason¬ 
able proposition that the publisher who is in the dark can 
best estimate the remunerativeness of a cheap edition. 
If it is hoped that, being in the dark, he may rashly 
venture, and the public may so profit, then the hope is 
that he may be tempted into a losing business. But the 
public cannot profit in the long run by losing busi¬ 
nesses. 

(Sir II. Holland.) Take the “ Life of Lord Macau¬ 
lay ” ; you know that Tauchnitz has published a cheap 
edition in four volumes,—a very neat edition, good paper 
and good print. Is it not possible that if this system of 
royalty is introduced, without considering whether the 
author would lose by it, a cheap edition like that would 
be put upon the market at once, and would pay the pub¬ 
lisher?—It is possible that it would be done earlier than 
it is now done. I take it that the normal course of things 
is that, first of all, the dear edition should be published 
and have its sale, and supply its market, and that then, 
when that sale has flagged, there should come the aim to 
supply a wider market by publishing a cheap edition. 

You are aware that one of the advantages which the 
advocates of this royalty system most strongly dwell 
upon, is that under the present system the great mass of 


VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 


43 


the reading public are not able to purchase the hooks; 
those who have the advantage of circulating libraries can 
get them and read them, but poorer persons can neither 
purchase nor read them, whereas under the other system 
an edition like Tauchnitz would be at once put out, and 
it is contended that this, though it might be a loss to the 
author, would be a benefit to the public?—Then I take 
it that the proposal really amounts to this, that whereas, 
at present, the poorer class of readers are inconvenienced 
by having to wait for a cheap edition a certain number 
of years, they shall, by this arrangement, be advantaged 
by having a cheap edition forthwith; which is to say 
that people with smaller amounts of money shall have 
no disadvantages from their smaller amounts of money. 
It is communistic practically: it is simply equalising the 
advantages of wealth and poverty. 

{Chairman.) Then we may assume that in your 
opinion the royalty system would not operate in cheapen¬ 
ing books in the long run?—I think that in the first 
place, supposing it should act in the manner intended, by 
producing rival editions, it would act in cheapening just 
that class of books which it would be a mischief to 
cheapen. I have already intimated in a previous reply, 
that the alleged advantage of cheapening books is to be 
taken with a qualification; inasmuch as there is a cheap¬ 
ening which is beneficial and a cheapening which is in¬ 
jurious. And I have got, I think, pretty clear evidence 
that the class of books cheapened would be a class which 
it is undesirable to cheapen. Being one of the committee 
of the London Library, I have some facilities for obtain¬ 
ing evidence with regard to the circulation of various 
classes of books; and I have got the librarian to draw me 
up what he entitles—“ Recorded circulation of the fol- 


44 


VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 


lowing books during tire three years following their intro¬ 
duction into the London Library.” Here, in the first 
place, is a book of science—Lyell’s “ Principles of Ge¬ 
ology ” ; that went out 28 times. Here, on the other 
hand, is a sensational book,—Dixon’s “ Spiritual 
Wives ” ; that went out 120 times. Here, again, is a 
highly instructive book,—Maine’s “ Ancient Law” ; that 
went out 29 times. Here is a book of tittle-tattle about 
old times,—“ Her Majesty’s Tower ” ; that went out 
127 times. Here, again, is another book of valuable in¬ 
quiry,—Lecky’s “ European Morals ” ; that went out 23 
times. Here is a book of gossip,—“ Crabb Robinson’s 
Diary ” ; that went out 154 times. Lecky’s “ History 
of Rationalism ” went out 13 times; Greville’s “ Me¬ 
moirs ” went out 116 times. Herschel’s “ Astronomy ” 
went out 25 times; Jesse’s “ George the Third” went 
out 67 times. I have added together these contrasted re¬ 
sults, and the grave instructive books, taken altogether, 
number 118 issues, while the sensational and gossiping 
books number 584 issues; that is to say, more than five 
times the number of issues. How, the London Library is, 
among circulating libraries at least, the one which is of 
all the highest in respect of the quality of its readers: it 
is the library of the elite of London. If, then, we see that 
there go out to these readers five times as many of these 
books which minister to the craving for excitement, and 
are really dissipating books, as there go out the grave, 
serious instructive books, we may judge what will be the 
proportion of demand for such books in the public at 
large. How let us ask what a publisher will do in face of 
these facts. He knows what these demands are; and he 
has to choose what books he will reprint. A publisher 
who has laid himself out for rival editions is compara- 


VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 


45 


tively unlikely to choose one of the really valuable books, 
which needs more circulating. I will not say he will never 
do it. He will do it sometimes; but he will be far more 
likely to choose one of these books appealing to a numer¬ 
ous public, and of which a cheap edition will sell largely. 
Hence, therefore, the obvious result will be to multiply 
these books of an inferior kind. How already that class 
of books is detrimentally large: already books that are 
bad in art, bad in tone, bad in substance, come pouring 
out from the press in such torrents as to very much sub¬ 
merge the really instructive books; and this measure 
would have the effect of making that torrent still greater, 
and of still more submerging the really instructive books. 
Therefore, I hold that if the stimulus to rival editions 
acted as it is expected to act, the result would be to mul¬ 
tiply the mischievous books. 

{Mr. Trollope .) Do you not think that in making the 
parallel that you have there made you have failed to 
consider the mental capacities of readers?—I was about, 
in answering the next question, to deal indirectly with 
that; pointing out that while there is a certain deter¬ 
mining of the quality of reading by the mental capacity, 
there is a certain range within which you may minister 
more or you may minister less. There are people who, 
if they are tempted, will spend all their time on light 
literature, and if they are less tempted will devote some 
of their time to grave literature. Already the graver 
books, the instructive books, those that really need cir¬ 
culating, are impeded very much by this enormous soli¬ 
citation from the multitude of books of a gossipy, sen¬ 
sational kind. People have but a certain amount of time, 
and a certain amount of money, to spend upon books. 
Hence what is taken of time and money for uninstructive 


46 


VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 


books is time and money taken away from the instructive; 
and I contend that if there were a diminution in the 
quantity of the books of this sensational kind published, 
there would be a larger reading of the really instruc¬ 
tive books; and that, conversely, the multiplication of 
this class of lighter books would tend to diminish the 
reading of instructive books. I am now speaking, not, 
of course, of the higher amusing books, because there are 
many that are works of value, but of the lower novels, 
Miss Braddon’s and others such. 

Do you think that a man coming home, say, from his 
8 or 10 hours labour in court day after day is in a con¬ 
dition to read Lyell’s Geology as men read one of Miss 
Braddon’s novels? We are speaking of some ordinary 
man.—No, not an ordinary man, certainly. 

Have we not to deal with literature for ordinary men ? 
—For both ordinary and extraordinary men; the whole 
public. 

Are not the ordinary men very much the more nu¬ 
merous ?—Certainly. 

Is it not, therefore, necessary to provide some kind of 
literature, as good as you can, but such that the ordinary 
mind can receive and can turn into some profit, together 
with the normal work of life?—T am not calling into 
question in the least the desirableness of a large supply 
of literature of an enlivening and amusing and pleasant 
kind, as well as a large supply of graver literature. My 
remarks point to the literature that is neither instructive 
nor aesthetic in the higher sense, but which is bad in 
art, bad in tone, worthless in matter. There is a large 
quantity of that literature, and that literature I take to 
be the one which will be the most fostered by the pro¬ 
posed measures. I do not in the least reprobate the read- 


VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 47 

ing of lighter works if they are good in quality. I refer 
to the class of works which 1 regard as not good in 
quality. 

But do you not think you must leave that to settle 
itself on those principles of free trade which you have 
just enunciated so clearly?—Certainly; I am objecting 
to a policy which would tend to encourage the one and 
not encourage the other. 

(Sir H. Holland.) The subscribers to the London 
Library are, as you say, the elite of readers?—Yes. 

And is not that the reason why there is this difference 
as to the reading of good and bad books taken out from 
that library, is it not attributable to the fact that these 
people have probably bought and have in their own 
houses the good books, but that they want to look 
through these other books, and therefore get them from 
the library?—There may be a qualification of that kind; 
but inasmuch as a very large proportion of the readers of 
the London Library are ladies, and those who come for 
lighter literature, I do not think it at all probable that 
they would have bought Lecky or Maine, or any books of 
that kind. 

I ask the question because I rather think that you 
will find a very curious difference from that which you 
have been stating if you go to the Manchester and Liver¬ 
pool free libraries. You will find there that the working 
men take out largely Macaulay’s “ History of England ” 
and that class of book?—Well, whatever qualifications 
may be made in this estimate, or the inferences from this 
estimate, I do not think they can touch the general pro¬ 
position that books of this kind which in the London 
Library circulate most largely, are books of the kind 
which circulate most largely among the general public, 




VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 


48 

and books of the kind which a publisher of rival editions 
would choose. That is my point.- 

But might not that very evil to which you refer be 
met by improving the taste of the majority of the poorer 
readers, by enabling them to get at once cheap editions 
of good books?—The question is, which are the cheap 
editions that will be issued. I contend that they, are 
the cheap editions of these books of a dissipating kind; 
and that the main effect will be to increase the dissipa¬ 
tion. 

You do not think that the earlier publication of a 
cheap edition would raise the tone of readers?—I do not 
see that it would do so, unless it could be shown that that 
would tell upon the graver and more instructive books. 
My next answer, I think, will be an answer to that. 

If you improve the tone of the readers, of course it 
does tell upon the graver books for those who have time 
to read the graver books; but there is a large class of 
readers who have not that time?—Yes. 

(Chairman.) Referring to the illustrations which 
you have just given of works which you would denomi¬ 
nate as worthless, or comparatively valueless, did I hear 
among them historical memoirs and journals?—“ Crabbe 
Robinson’s Diary,” for instance; I call that a book of 
gossip which anybody may read and be none the better 
for it. 

The question I should like to ask is, are you not of 
opinion that books of that sort are extremely valuable to 
the intending historian of the epoch to which they refer? 
—It may be that there are in them materials for him. 
I have not read the “ Greville Memoirs ” myself, and I 
have no intention of reading it; but my impression is 
that the great mass of it is an appeal to the love of gossip 


VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 


40 


and scandal, and that it is a book which, if not read at 
all, would leave persons just as well off or better. 

Take “ Lord Hervey’s Memoirs/ 7 in the reign of 
George the Second; if you had the privilege of reading 
that book you would probably say it was an extremely 
sensational book, but knowing the position which Lord 
Hervey occupied in the Court and family of George the 
Second, I presume we may take for granted that the ex¬ 
traordinary facts which he relates are facts; and if so 
they would form the basis of a great deal of truthful his¬ 
tory, which would be written of that reign; would not 
that be so?—It might be so, no doubt. 

Then we understand you to mean that in your opin¬ 
ion the royalty system would not cheapen works that you 
would describe as valuable?—I think, on the average of 
cases, quite the contrary. I believe the system would 
raise the prices of the graver books. Ask what a pub¬ 
lisher will say to himself when about to publish a book of 
that kind, of which he forms a good opinion. “ I have 
had a high estimate given of this book. The man is a 
man to be trusted; the book possibly will be a success. 
Still my experiences of grave books generally, are such 
that I know the chances are rather against its succeeding. 
If it should be a success, and if I had ten years now to sell 
the edition, I might print 1,000; but, under this arrange¬ 
ment, a grave book not selling 1,000 in three years, or 
anything like it, it will never do for me to print 1,000. 
Should it be much talked about by the end of the three 
years, there might be a rival edition, and my stock would 
be left on my hands. Hence, now that there is this very 
short time in which I can sell the book, I must print a 
smaller number—say 500. But if I print 500 and ex¬ 
pect to get back outlay and a profit on that small number, 


50 


VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 


I must charge more than I should do if I printed 1,000 
and had time to sell them. Therefore the price must he 
raised.” In the case of a book which did turn out a suc¬ 
cess, it might eventually happen that there would be a 
cheap edition issued, and that that raised price would not 
be permanent; but this argument of the publisher with 
himself, would lead him to raise the price, not only of 
that book, but of the other grave books which he pub¬ 
lished, all of which would stand in the same position of 
possibly being successes, but not probably; and of these, 
the great mass, the nine out of ten that did not succeed, 
the price would remain higher,—would never be lowered. 
There would not only be that reason for raising the price: 
there would be a further one. If a man in the wholesale 
book-trade, who puts down his name for a certain num¬ 
ber of copies, knows that a cheaper edition will possibly 
come out by-and-bye, the result will be that he will take 
a smaller number of copies than he would otherwise do. 
At the beginning he may take his 25 or 13, as the case 
may be; but as the end of the three years is approaching 
he will say, “ No, I will not take a large number; I must 
take two or three.” Then, still further, the reader him¬ 
self will be under the same bias. He will say—“ Well 
this book is one I ought to have: I hear it highly spoken 
of, but it is probable that there will be by-and-bye a cheap 
edition; I will wait till the end of the three years.” 
That is to say, both wholesale dealers and readers would 
earlier stop their purchases, thinking there might be a 
cheap edition; and that would further tend to diminish 
the number printed and to raise the price. 

(Sir H. Holland.) Might it not be that the pub¬ 
lisher, instead of entering into those calculations that you 
have pointed out, would consider, knowing that other 


VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 


51 


editions may appear, “ What is the cheapest form in 
which I can print this book? What can I afford to give 
the author consistently with bringing out the cheapest 
possible book, so that I may be secure against any other 
publisher bringing out a cheaper edition 77 ?—It would 
be a very reasonable argument, if he knew which, out of 
these various books of the graver kind, was going to suc¬ 
ceed; but since nine out of ten do not succeed—do not 
succeed, at least, to the extent of getting to a second 
edition—do not succeed, therefore, so far as to make it at 
all likely that there would be a rival edition, and that a 
cheap edition would pay, he will never argue so; inas¬ 
much as he would in that case be printing, of the nine 
books that would not succeed sufficiently, a larger edi¬ 
tion than he would ever sell. He must begin in all these 
cases of doubtful grave books by printing small editions. 

Where an author brings a book to a publisher, the 
first question the publisher asks himself is, of course, this, 
“ Is this book likely to takej 77 and then if he thinks it 
will take, he has to consider further, in what degree 
will it take? Will it have a large sale or limited sale? 
Because, in each case the book may be a success, though 
in a different degree. Then, if it is competent for any 
other publisher to publish an edition, it may be assumed 
that such edition would be a cheap one; and, therefore, 
has not the original publisher this further question to 
put to himself: “ The book, I think, will take, but look¬ 
ing to the chances of a cheaper edition, I must see what 
compensation I can give to the author, publishing this 
book as cheap as possible, so that I may not be underbid 
hereafter 77 ?—But, I think, that the experiences of pub¬ 
lishers show that it does not answer their purpose to run 
the risk of cheap editions with the great mass of graver 


52 


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books; inasmuch as nine out of ten of them do not pay 
their expenses—and do not pay their expenses, not be¬ 
cause of the high price, but because they do not get into 
vogue at all. The publisher would argue—“ It will 
never do to print cheap editions of all these ten because 
one out of the number will succeed.” 

Of course he does not do so now, because there is not 
any possibility of another publisher underbidding him by 
a cheap edition; but I am assuming a case where any 
publisher, on payment of a royalty, can publish a cheap 
edition: then the original publisher would have to con¬ 
sider, “ How cheaply can I publish this edition so that I 
may not be underbid by another publisher ” ?—That, I 
say, would altogether depend upon the experience of the 
publishers as to what was, in the average of cases, the 
sale of a new book. In most instances the sale of a new 
grave book is very small—not sufficient to pay the ex¬ 
penses; and I think the publisher would make a great 
mistake if, in the case of such a book, he counted upon 
getting a large sale at once by a low price. The other 
argument would, it seems to me, be the one he would use. 
In fact, I not only think so, but I find my publishers 
think so. 

0 Chairman .) Do you wish to instance any particular 
case in which you believe that a fixed royalty, such as we 
heard about, would have hindered the diffusion of a book 
of permanent value?—Yes; I have an extremely striking 
and, I think, wholly conclusive, instance of the fatal ef¬ 
fects,—the extensive fatal effects,—that would have re¬ 
sulted had there been any such system existing as that 
proposed. I refer to the “ International Scientific Series.” 
I happen to know all about the initiation of that. It was 
set on foot by an American friend of mine, Prof. You- 


VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 


53 


mans, who came over here for the purpose. I aided him, 
and know the difficulties that were to be contended with, 
and a good deal concerning the negotiations. The pur¬ 
pose was to have a series of books written by the best men 
of the time, in all the various sciences, which should 
treat of certain small divisions of the sciences that are 
» * n states of rapid growth—giving to the public, in popu¬ 
lar form, the highest and latest results; and it was pro¬ 
posed, as a means of achieving this end, that there should 
be an international arrangement, which should secure to 
authors certain portions of profits coming from transla¬ 
tions, as well as profits from originals at home, and the 
hope was that some publisher might be obtained who 
would remunerate these authors of the highest type at 
good rates, so as to induce them to contribute volumes to 
the series. Well, this attempt, after much trouble, suc¬ 
ceeded. A number of the leading scientific men of Eng¬ 
land, France, and Germany were induced to co-operate. 
A publisher was found, or rather publishers here and 
elsewhere, to enter into the desired arrangements; and 
an English publisher was found who offered such terms 
to authors in England as led men in the first rank (and 
I may mention Prof. Huxley, and Prof. Tyndall, and 
Prof. Bain, and Prof. Balfour Stewart, and a great num¬ 
ber of others) to promise to write volumes. These men, 
I know, were reluctant, as busy men, with their many 
avocations, and their incomes to get for their families, 
would naturally be, and were induced to enter into the 
scheme only on its being made manifest to them that 
they would reap good profits. The English publisher 
offered a 20 per cent, commission on the retail price, paid 
down on first publication, and for every subsequent edi¬ 
tion paid six months after date; and there were certain 




54 


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smaller percentages to come from abroad. Now, the 
English publisher proposed to give those terms, knowing 
that it would be impossible for him to get back his out¬ 
lay unless he had a number of years in which to do it. 
He had to stereotype, he had to pay at once these sums to 
authors, and he had to publish the books at a cheap rate; 
for, by the way, I ought to have said that part of the 
plan was that these books should be sold at low prices. I 
may instance a volume of 420 pages for 5s. These terms 
would, I take it, have been absolutely out of the question 
had there been such an arrangement as that under which 
the publisher, instead of having many years to recoup 
himself, would have had rival editions to compete with in 
the space of three years. I do not, however, put that as 
an opinion. I have taken the precaution to obtain from 
Mr. King, the publisher, a definite answer on the point. 
This is the paragraph of his letter which is specially rele¬ 
vant: —“ Authors can have no difficulty in proving that 
this ” (meaning the system which I told him was pro¬ 
posed) “ would be most unjust to them, a confiscation, in 
fact, of their property; but I, from a publisher’s point of 
view, should like to declare that the terms on which my 
firm have undertaken the ‘ International Scientific 
Series 9 would be impossible on such a limitation.” Now 
here, then, we have a series of highly valuable books, I 
think of the kind specially to be encouraged, amounting 
to between 20 and 30 already published, and potentially 
to a much larger number, which would not have existed 
at all had there been in force the arrangement proposed; 
inasmuch as the publisher affirms that he would not have 
offered such terms, and I can testify that in the absence 
of terms as tempting as those, authors would not have 
agreed to co-operate. 


VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 


55 


(Sir II. Holland.) Was Mr. King made aware that 
there would be a limited time within which each volume 
would be protected?—Yes, three years. He did not 
count upon anything like adequate return in that time. 
He says—“ We are a long way off profit as yet on the 
series ” (I think it is nearly five years since it com¬ 
menced), “ although I am convinced that ultimately we 
and the authors, too, will be well satisfied.” 

That would raise the question which I wanted to put, 
whether in a case like that it would have been possible 
to have published a cheaper edition than the one now 
published?—Yes, in the absence of the author’s 20 per 
cent. 

In the case which you have brought to our notice may 
we assume that the cheapest form of edition was pub¬ 
lished consistently with fair profit to the author and pub¬ 
lisher ?—I think, certainly, with anything like a tolerable 
mode of getting up. Of course you may bring down a 
thing to rubbishing type and straw paper; but I was 
speaking of a presentable book. They are very cheap for 
presentable books. 

That, perhaps, would be one of the evils arising from 
a system of royalty, that you would get' extremely bad 
and incorrect editions published of a book, even in the 
first instance?—Very likely. 

Because it would be the publisher’s object, if that 
system were thoroughly established, to publish such an 
edition that another publisher could not underbid him 
at the end of the three years; that would be, would it 
not, the general object of the publisher?—Yes. 

In this case I understand you to say that he could 
not, consistently with fair profits to the author and pub¬ 
lisher, and consistently with its being a properly printed 


56 


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work, without which a work of that kind would he of 
very little value, have published a cheaper edition?-^ 
He could not. 

And yet he would not have been able to publish such 
an edition if he had run the risk of being underbid?— 
Certainly not. He says—“ I confess my idea in propos¬ 
ing such terms as those of the ‘ International Scientific 
Series/ looked forward to a yearly increasing interest in 
scientific literature, and an ever enlarging circle of read¬ 
ers able to appreciate books of a high class.” So he was 
looking for a distant effect. 

I am anxious, as Mr. King is not here, to get your 
own opinion upon that point; do you concur in his 
views ?-—Yes, certainly. 

(Chairman.) Have you any further reasons for 
thinking that measures of the kind which we have been 
discussing, taken in the interest of cheapening books, 
might end in doing the reverse?—I think there is an¬ 
other way in which there would be a general operation 
of this system of rival editions, which would have, indi¬ 
rectly, the effect of raising the prices all round; namely, 
the waste of stock. It would inevitably happen that 
every publisher of an original edition would, from time 
to time, have a rival edition make its appearance before 
his edition was sold. In that case his remnant of an edi¬ 
tion got up in a relatively expensive style, would either 
i have to be not sold at all or sold at a sacrifice. Further, 
it would happen from time to time that two publishers, 
unknown to one another, would issue rival editions, both 
of which would not be demanded; there would therefore 
be a waste of stock. Evidently the system of competing 
with one another in the dark, would continually lead to 
production in excess of demand. What would be the 


VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 


5Y 


result? If there is an increased percentage of waste 
stock, that has somehow to he paid for, if business is to 
be carried on at all. And as we know that tradesmen 
have to raise their average prices to cover their bad 
debts; so, if publishers find an increase of bad stock they 
must raise their prices to cover the loss on bad stock. 

(Mr. Trollope.) Would not the ordinary laws of 
trade correct such an evil?—This interference with the 
laws of trade would entail an abnormal production of 
waste stock. Under the present system a publisher does 
not publish a cheap edition till the other is gone; but 
under the proposed system, with cheap copies perhaps 
sent from the colonies, there must be waste stock. 

When the system had been in operation for a time 
do you not consider that that evil would correct itself by 
the ordinary laws of trade? We are aware that at first 
the disruption of an existing state of things will create 
much confusion, and such evil as you have described; 
but are you not of opinion that this would rectify itself 
after a time?—I do not see how it could rectify itself, 
if the system of rival editions continued, and operated 
in the way that it is expected to do. But as I have al¬ 
ready indicated by certain hypothetical remarks, I do 
not think it would continue and operate in that way. I 
say, however, that if rival editions were issued by men 
not knowing each other’s doings, there must from time to 
time occur in the business of each publisher loss of stock. 

(Chairman.) From the answer to the last question 
that has been put by Mr. Trollope I gather it to be your 
opinion that the arrangement would be practically in¬ 
operative so far as the anticipated competition was con¬ 
cerned?—I think that after a period of perturbation, a 
period of fighting and general disaster in the publishing 
5 


58 


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business, there would arise a tacit understanding among 
publishing houses, which would, in a large degree, de¬ 
feat the purpose of the measure; and I say this on the 
strength of definite facts furnished by trade-practices 
in America. These facts I have from the before-named 
American friend, Prof. Youmans, with whom from time 
to time, when over here, I have had to discuss the prob¬ 
ability of pirated editions of my own books in America. 
My books in America are published by a large house 
there, the Appletons; and they deal with me very fairly 
—pay me as well as American authors are paid. I have 
gathered from Prof. Youmans that the danger of the 
issue of rival editions of my books in America is very 
small; because there exists among the American pub¬ 
lishing houses, the understanding that when one house 
brings out an English book, other houses will not inter¬ 
fere: the mere circumstance of having been the first 
to seize upon a book, is held to give a priority, such as 
is tacitly regarded as a monopoly. That condition of 
things has been established through a process of fighting; 
for when it did at first happen that American houses 
brought out rival editions of the same English book, 
or one edition, rather, after another, that, of course, was 
a declaration of war between the two houses, and im¬ 
mediately there was retaliation, and it ended in a fight. 
The house attacked revenged itself by issuing, perhaps, 
a still cheaper edition, or by doing the like thing with 
some work subsequently published by the aggressing 
house, and after bleeding one another in this way for a 
length of time there resulted a treaty of peace, and a 
gradual establishment of this understanding, that they 
would respect each other’s priorities. If that is what 
happened in America, when the only claim that a pub- 


VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 


59 


Usher had to the exclusive publication of a book was the 
claim established by prior seizing of it, of prior printing, 
much more will it happen here in England, among pub¬ 
lishers who have paid for their books, or who have en¬ 
tered into arrangements with authors for half profits, 
or what not. Having established certain equitable 
claims to these books they will very much more decidedly 
fight any houses that interfere with them, by issuing 
rival editions. If the men who have ill-founded claims 
fight, still more will the men who have well-founded 
claims fight. Hence, there would occur among the Eng¬ 
lish publishers, when this system cameHnto operation, 
a period of warfare lasting, probably, for some years, 
and ending in a peace based on the understanding that 
any publisher who had brought out a book would be 
regarded as having an exclusive claim to it, and would 
not be interfered with. The fear of retaliation would 
prevent the issue of the rival editions. 

(Sir Henry Holland.) And therefore would pre¬ 
vent the publication by a rival publisher of a cheaper 
edition?—Yes. 

(Chairman.) Then on the grounds that you have ex¬ 
plained, you think the system would become before long 
wholly inoperative?—Hot wholly inoperative, I think: 
inoperative for good, not inoperative for evil. In the 
course of this early phase to be passed through, in which 
houses issued rival editions against each other and got 
into the state of warfare, it would happen that the 
weaker would go to the wall: the smaller publishers 
would not be able to stand in the fight with the larger 
publishers, and they would tend to fail. And further, 
although treaties of peace would be eventually reached 
between the more powerful publishers, who would be 


60 


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afraid of eacli other, and dare not issue rival editions of 
each others books, there would be no such feeling on 
the part of large publishers towards small publishers. If 
a small publisher happened to issue a successful book, 
a larger publisher would have no fear in issuing a rival 
edition of that. Hence, therefore, the tendency would 
be for the small publishers to be ruined from having 
their successful books taken away from them. But that 
would not be the only tendency: there would be a sec¬ 
ondary tendency working the same way. For after this 
fighting had gone on a year or two, it would become 
notorious among authors that if they published their 
books with small publishers they would be in danger of 
rival editions, in case of success, being issued by large 
publishers; but that, contrariwise, if they published with 
large publishers they would be in no danger of rival 
editions. Hence they would desert the small publishers; 
and in a double way the small publishers would lose 
their business. We should progress towards a monopoly 
of a few large houses; and the power which such have 
already of dictating terms to authors, would become 
still greater. 

And if I understand you rightly, the power would 
be not only to dictate terms to authors but of price to the 
public?—Yes, they would be able to combine. When 
you got a small number of publishers, and they could 
agree to a system of terms: the public would be power¬ 
less against them, and authors would be powerless against 
them. 

Then, in your opinion, is there any way by which 
works could be cheapened by legislative enactment?— 
There is one way, and that a way in principle exactly 
the reverse of that which is contended for in this meas- 


VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 


61 


ure; namely, the extension of copyright. I do not mean 
the extension in time; I mean the extension in area. On 
this point I am happy to say there appears to be agree¬ 
ment between the two sides. From the evidence which 
I have read I gather that it is proposed along with this 
limitation of copyright in time to extend copyright in i 
area. I do not altogether understand the theory which, 
while it ignores an author’s equitable claim to the product 
of his brain-work in respect of duration, insists upon the 
equity of his claim to that product of his brain-work, as 
extending not only to his own nation but to other na¬ 
tions. However, I am glad to have agreement so far; 
and I hold, along with those who support the proposed 
measure, that the enlargement of the markets by means 
of international copyright would be a very effectual 
means of cheapening books. It would be a more effectual 
means of cheapening the best books. I may refer again 
to this International Scientific Series. One of the means 
by which that series has been made cheap, was, that the 
American publisher and the English publisher, agreed 
to share between them the cost of production, in so far 
as that the American publisher had duplicate stereotype 
plates and paid half the cost of setting up the type. 
How it is clear that if the outlay is diminished by hav¬ 
ing one cost of composition for two countries instead of 
a cost for each, the book can be issued at a lower rate in 
both countries than it could otherwise be. And that ar¬ 
rangement which was voluntarily made, under a kind 
of spontaneous copyright, in the case of the International 
Series, would be forced, as it were, upon publishers in 
the case of an established copyright. Consequently there 
would be habitually an economization of the cost of pro¬ 
duction, by dividing it between the two countries; and 


62 


VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 


hence there would be a lowering of the price. And 
then there is the further fact that this would tell espe¬ 
cially upon the more serious books. On books of a 
popular kind the chief cost is for paper and print: large 
editions being printed. Therefore it does not so much 
matter in America having to set up the type afresh. 
But in the case of a grave book of which the circulation 
is small, the cost of composition is the main element in 
the cost; and the economization of that cost, by dividing 
it between England and America, would serve very con¬ 
siderably to lower the price. 

(Dr. Smith.) Then, if I understand you aright, you 
do not approve of the principle adopted in the Canada 
Act, in the Act passed by the Canadian Legislature of 
1875, confirmed by the Imperial Act, by which it is 
necessary in order to obtain copyright in Canada that 
the works should be set up afresh ?—I think that it is ob¬ 
viously nothing else than a means of staving off the op¬ 
position of printers, and a very mischievous arrangement. 

Would it not be the fact that if a work could be set 
up once for all in the country, and circulate in the two 
countries, the price of the book would be diminished? 
—Unquestionably. 

(Sir H. Holland.) You are aware of the difficulties 
that have been raised by the United States publishers; 
that constant attempts have been made ever since 1854 
and before to make a copyright convention, and that 
there is no very great probability of these attempts prov¬ 
ing successful. Have you any particular suggestion to 
bring before the Commissioners which would in your 
opinion tend towards making the Americans favourable 
to a convention?—I am sorry to say I do not see my way 
towards any such suggestion. I am merely replying to 


VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 


63 


the general question whether legislation could do any¬ 
thing to cheapen books, and saying that the only thing 
I thought it could do would be to get, in some way, an 
extension of area for copyright. 

The following is the speech referred to above as hav¬ 
ing been made at a meeting of the National Association 
for the Promotion of Social Science . 

With respect to the duration of copyright, I would 
remark first, that if any reason is to be given fpr fixing 
a term of years, a good one may be given for the Com¬ 
missioners proposal; whereas, for the term proposed in 
this bill I see no reason: why fifty rather than sixty or 
forty should be fixed cannot be shown; but it may be 
shown why copyright for life and thirty years after death 
is reasonable. The author is a man carrying on a money¬ 
getting occupation, and should, if possible, be put in the 
position of feeling that he is doing as well as may be for 
his family, and that he is not by following that occupa¬ 
tion in place of another sacrificing them. If he is con¬ 
scious that by pursuing authorship he runs the risk of 
leaving his children without any provision after his 
death, he may be led to think that duty to them should 
make him choose another occupation. But by making 
the duration of copyright for his life and thirty years 
afterwards, he is encouraged by a reasonable belief 
that he will leave means for supporting his family for a 
term sufficient to allow his children to be brought to 
a self-supporting maturity. Let me next refer to an¬ 
other reason given very clearly by Mr. Westlake for 
preferring a fixed termination of copyright after death, 
rather than a series of terminations of different dates, for 



64 


VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 


the works published at different dates. It happens that I 
can give personal illustrations of the great inconven¬ 
iences, and I may say mischiefs, which would arise from 
the termination of an author’s copyrights at different 
dates. I was not aware until two days ago, when talk¬ 
ing to Dr. Smith on this question, that the existing 
cheap edition of Hallam’s Middle Ages is an imperfect 
work. I have been making quotations from that work. 
I shall now have to go back on my quotations and see 
if I have been betrayed into errors; and observe, further, 
that but for mere accident I should have been in the pre¬ 
dicament of, perhaps, having quoted obsolete passages. 
I will give a second illustration, also personal, but in 
another way. In 1862 I published a work entitled First 
Principles. Although the ideas contained in it were true 
as far as they went, they were imperfectly developed 
and were imperfectly organised. That which was pri¬ 
mary was put as secondary and vice versa. At the end 
of five years I published a second or a re-organised edi¬ 
tion presenting the doctrine under quite a different 
aspect. Now what would happen in this case supposing 
copyrights terminated at the end of fifty years? My 
edition of 1862 would be republished in a cheap form, 
while the re-organized edition was still copyright; and 
for the succeeding 5 years there would be a propagation 
of my erroneous views; and the imperfect edition, fill¬ 
ing the market, would hinder the spread of the perfect 
edition when subsequently published. In brief I may 
say that this proposal is one which, if carried out, would 
establish a premium on the propagation of error. I pass 
how to the question of colonial reprints. If the clause 
which gives reprinting powers, under certain conditions, 
had been a clause in a bill proposed centuries ago, I 


VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 


65 


should not have been surprised; but that such a clause 
should appear in a bill at the present time after the free 
trade doctrines have been established, is to me astound¬ 
ing. I read in this clause (the 72nd)—“ Whereas it is 
desirable to provide means whereby the inhabitants of 
all British possessions may obtain, at a moderate price, 
a sufficient supply of books . . Thus we have ac¬ 
tually come back to the notion that it is the duty of the 
state to provide the colonies with a supply of a com¬ 
modity at a moderate price. It is really a reversion to 
the form of legislation which in old times dictated the 
rates of wages, provided for the qualities and quantities 
of goods, entered into factories to inspect processes of 
production, established bounties and restrictions, and so 
forth. For all these things were done with the view of 
obtaining good supplies of commodities at reasonable 
rates. What can possibly be the defence for this revival 
of antique legislation? It is that though the state has 
proved a bad judge in respect of food and clothing, and 
things of daily use, it is likely to be a good judge in re¬ 
spect of literature? Is it that having failed in the rela¬ 
tively easy thing, it will succeed in the relatively diffi¬ 
cult thing? Then, further, what is the particular author¬ 
ity which it is proposed to constitute the judge? The 
Governor of the colony. Who is he? Usually he is a 
general. Is he a fit man to judge whether a certain book 
is adequately supplied in the colony, and whether such 
and such a price is a reasonable one for it? Then what is 
proposed by way of defence for the author? The author 
is to have due notice of the proposed reprint. He may, 
it seems, go personally and make objections; but what 
author will ever go to the colony to oppose? He may do 
it by his agent; but what agent has the author in a 


00 VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 

colony? He probably knows nobody there. Supposing 
he could find a fit agent, what likelihood is there of the 
cost of such a transaction ever being repaid, even suppos¬ 
ing he succeeds in his opposition? The cost of the trans¬ 
action would, probably, be more than the author would 
get for an edition of his work. Practically, therefore, 
the clause involves abolition of copyright in the colony; 
and we have good reasons for suspecting that the pro¬ 
posed royalty would bring next to nothing. Even sup¬ 
posing it should turn out that the arrangement worked 
as intended, I should still demur to the assumption that 
the colony would benefit. It continually happens in 
every kind of legislation that the unanticipated results 
immensely exceed in importance the anticipated results. 
We may suspect it would be so here. For what would 
be the books which a colonial publisher would be likely 
to reprint? Clearly the books which would repay him. 
What would they be? Why the novels of the day, the 
gossiping biographies, the books which feed the voracious 
appetite for personalities: those would be the books they 
would seize upon for the purpose of reprinting. But the 
books of an instructive kind, the books of small circula¬ 
tion, would not, in most cases, pay the expenses of their 
republication. But if, while you do not cheapen the in¬ 
structive books, you do cheapen the amusing books, you 
make it easier for people to satiate their appetites upon 
these and diminish their appetites for the others. If 
those who have daily but a short time for reading can get 
easy access to the one kind of literature, while the access 
to the other kind is difficult, they will be led to read more 
of the first than they would otherwise do, at the expense 
of the last. The consequence will be not an educating 
influence but an uneducating influence. Before closing, 


VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 


67 


let me say a few words on the general question of copy¬ 
right. There is a current belief, which was expressed 
before the commission, that copyright is an artificial ar¬ 
rangement—that it is some privilege granted by the state 
to secure the author a monopoly. I hold this to be an er¬ 
roneous view. If the state will in this matter do what the 
state has to do in all other matters of commerce, namely, 
enforce contracts, copyright comes into existence as a 
matter of course. In all other trading transactions, the 
law recognises contracts, both overt and tacit. It not 
only recognises those in which there has been an agree¬ 
ment by signature; it recognises those in which not even 
an oral agreement has been made. If a man goes into 
a shop and asks for a pound of tea or any other com¬ 
modity, and it is handed over to him, it is not supposed 
to be requisite that he should specify beforehand that he 
will give so much money for it. That is to say, the state 
in these cases recognises the tacit contract to pay a price, 
though this has not been mentioned. What is the tacit 
contract with regard to a book? When the buyer of a 
book goes into a shop and buys from the author’s agent, 
what is the contract entered into in the purchase of that 
book? The tacit understanding is that it is sold for the 
purpose of reading, either by the individual or other in¬ 
dividuals, and for no other purpose. Ask what would 
happen if the purchaser announced that he was about to 
use that book for reprinting. Clearly it would either not 
be sold to him at all, or it would be sold at a relatively 
immense price^-a price such as would cover the profit on 
the edition. If, therefore, the law is to enforce tacit con¬ 
tracts, it is to enforce this tacit contract, that the book 
bought shall be for reading purposes and not for reprint¬ 
ing purposes; and if it enforces this tacit contract, copy- 


68 


VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 


right results as a consequence. I contend, then, that the 
state has nothing more to do in the matter than to make 
provisions for carrying out this tacit contract in all its 
details. A word as to the cheapening of literature. The 
true way to get cheap books is rigorously to abide by 
copyright as thus resulting, and to extend its area. Such 
extension of copyright as would bring under it a larger 
population, and therefore a larger number of purchasers, 
would make it possible to lower the prices of books; but 
if you narrow the area of the copyright and so dimin¬ 
ish the number of purchasers of the book, you neces¬ 
sarily raise its price. This proposed arrangement, by 
which colonists are to have a cheaper book, will, by cut¬ 
ting off the colonial sale of the English edition, raise the 
price in England. Conversely, if copyright could be ex¬ 
tended by including the United States, the prices of all 
books might be lowered. Where there is an agreement, 
as there frequently is already, between British and 
American publishers to share the cost of composition and 
stereotyping, the prices charged for books are reduced 
both here and in America. Under an international copy¬ 
right this exceptional result would become a general 
result. 

In reply to objections there were the following supple¬ 
mentary remarks. 

It is rather odd that we should get to the abstract 
question at the end of our discussion, and not at the be¬ 
ginning. We should have settled the basis at first. I 
now find myself in the position of having to prove that 
copyright is not, as it has been called, a monopoly; and 
to prove that the maintenance of copyright is really free 
trade. I can hardly go into the matter adequately now; 


VIEWS CONCERNING COPYRIGHT. 


69 


but I would point out that a monopoly, properly so-called, 
and free trade, properly so-called, have these charac¬ 
ters. The monopolist is a man who stands in the way 
of some one who, in the natural order of things, would 
be able to carry on some business in his absence just 
as well as in his presence. The free-trader is one who 
needs no aid from the monopolist, but simply wishes to 
do that which he could do did the monopolist not exist. 
But one who, wishing to reprint an author’s book, calls 
the author a monopolist for preventing him, stands in a 
widely different position. He proposes not simply to 
use his powers with the aid of such natural resources 
as are open to all. He proposes to use that which would 
not exist but for the author.. It is, therefore, an utter 
misuse of the word to call the author’s claim a monopoly. 
Moreover, those who so call it show the fallacy of their 
characterization by not daring to act upon it. Free 
trade makes no compromise with monopoly, rightly so- 
called. The free trader is ready to abolish monopoly at 
once, and makes no terms with it—sees no need for fos¬ 
tering it. Whereas those who take the position that 
copyright is a monopoly are obliged to admit that you 
must allow this so-called monopoly for a time. They 
dare not propose that the moment an author’s book is 
published, any one should be alloAved to reprint it; and 
they thus prove that they have not the courage of their 
opinions—do not really believe that which they profess 
to believe. On the other hand, I contend, as before, that 
freedom of trade is essentially freedom of contract, and 
that if authors, through their agents, are allowed to 
make what contracts they please with book-buyers, while 
the state stands by and enforces the contracts made, 
copyright necessarily comes into existence. 


70 


A EE JOINDER TO MR. McLENNAN. 


A REJOINDER TO MR. McLENNAN. 

In Part III of the Principles of Sociology , dealing 
with “ Domestic Institutions*” I had occasion to criticize 
certain of the views set forth by Mr. McLennan in his 
Primitive Marriage. Sometime after, in two articles in 
The Fortnightly Review , the last of which appeared in 
June, 1877, he replied to my criticisms. To prevent 
prolongation of the controversy, the Editor of The Fort¬ 
nightly Review sent me a proof of this last article; with 
the result that what I had to say in answer was appended. 
As Mr. McLennan’s essays above named have, along 
with others, been put into a permanent form, it seems 
fit that permanence should be given to my response. The 
few pages occupied run as follows:— 

Forms of family produced by descent in the male 
line, are habitually characterized by a law of succession 
which gives the sons of the eldest precedence over his 
brothers. Contrariwise, forms of family in which de¬ 
scent in the female line persists, wholly or partially, be¬ 
cause paternity is unsettled or but partially settled, are 
characterized by a law of succession under which broth¬ 
ers takes precedence of sons. Hence an institution which 
requires a younger brother to beget an heir for an elder 
brother who dies without one, and which thus carries 
to an extreme the claims of sons versus the claims of 
brothers, seems like a result of a family system charac- 


A REJOINDER TO MR. McLENNAN. 71 

terized by established descent in the male line. Mr. 
McLennan, however, considers this peculiar institution 
to be derived from a form of family in which, from in¬ 
definiteness of paternity, male kinship in the descending 
line is imperfectly established. As he interprets the mat¬ 
ter, cause and consequence stand thus:—“ On every » 
view, then,” he says, “ the succession of brothers in 
preference to sons must be accepted as a remainder of 
polyandry” (p. 705). Nevertheless he represents, as a 
remainder of polyandry, this Levirate system, which 
gives such preference to sons that even the nominal 
son of the eldest brother excludes a younger brother. 

Though Mr. McLennan thinks “ it is impossible not 
to believe ” that this is the origin of the Levirate (Studies 
in Ancient History , p. 162), I have ventured to suggest 
another possible interpretation. I have shown that where 
women are bought and sold as property, they are also 
inherited as property. I have given six cases where 
widows are inherited by brothers who claim them as well 
as other belongings of the deceased; and have pointed 
out that in two of these instances, the nearest relation 
“ had a right ” to the widow, in the absence of a brother. 
As further showing how transfers of widows are origi¬ 
nally transfers of property, I have given six cases in 
which sons inherit their father’s wives (save their own 
mothers).* Here let me add other instances having like 
implications. Speaking of the Kakhyens, Anderson, in 
his Mandalay to Momien (pp. 139—142), says, “ the 
curious custom Obtains that a widow becomes the wife of 
the senior brother-in-law, even though he be already 
married. And Wood tells us of the Kirghiz, that on a 


* Principles of Sociology, i, 680. 


72 A REJOINDER TO MR. McLENNAN. 

husband’s death the wife goes to his brother, and on liis 
decease becomes the property of the next of kin. We 
have, then, multitudinous proofs that the taking to wife 
deceased brothers’ widows (not in these cases associated 
with polyandry, but with polygyny), is part of the suc¬ 
cession to property in general; and this was originally 
the case among the Hebrews. The inference which Mr. 
McLennan draws from the ancient tradition concerning 
Tamar, does not correspond with the view which the Rab¬ 
bins held respecting the original form of the Levir mar¬ 
riage. As shown by a passage in Lewis ( Origines 
Hebrew , ii. 498), the Rabbins saw in Levir marriage, 
essentially a right of the brother, not of the widow. At 
first sight it is not manifest how what was originally a 
right of the brother, became transformed into a duty; 
but I have given some facts which throw light upon the 
transformation. Even among a people so little advanced 
as the Chippewas, the claim of a dead brother’s wife as 
property, had so far changed that the assigned reason for 
marrying her was the obligation to take care of the 
brother’s children; and I have cited the case of an Egyp¬ 
tian who said he married his brother’s widow because “ he 
considered it his duty to provide for her and her chil¬ 
dren.” Following the clue given by these cases, I have 
suggested (op. cit. p. 692) that the duty of raising up 
seed to a dead brother was originally the duty of raising 
the seed the dead brother had left, that is, his children; 
and that this eventually passed by misinterpretation into 
the duty of preserving his line, not by rearing existing 
children, but by begetting a son in his name when he had 
none—a misinterpretation prompted by that intense crav¬ 
ing to survive in name through future times, described in 
Psalm xlix. 11:—“ Their inward thought is that their 


A REJOINDER TO MR. McLENNAN. 73 

houses shall continue for ever. . . . They call their 
lands after their own names.” When we remember that 
even now, estates are sometimes bequeathed on condition 
of adopting the name of the testator, and so nominally 
maintaining the line, we shall understand the motive 
which exaggerated the duty of raising a brother’s heir 
until it became the duty of raising an heir to him. 
Should Mr. McLennan contend that this transformation 
of what was once a beneficial right into an injurious obli¬ 
gation is improbable, then I make two replies. The first 
is, that among many remarkable social transformations, 
there may be named one immediately relating to mar¬ 
riage-customs, which presents us with a no less complete 
inversion. Change from wife-purchase to the reception 
of a dowry with a wife, does not seem a change likely to 
result by gradual transition; yet it did so result. The 
property given for the bride, originally appropriated en¬ 
tirely by the father, ceased in course of time to be wholly 
retained by him, and he gave part to his daughter for her 
special use after her marriage. What he gave to her 
grew, and what was paid for her dwindled, until-eventu¬ 
ally the husband’s payment became a symbol, while the 
father’s gift developed into a substantial dower. The 
second reply is that this transformation is less difficult to 
understand than the one alleged by Mr. McLennan. For 
according to him, the arrangement by which, in the poly- 
andric family, an elder brother’s death profits the next 
brother by devolving on him “ his property, authority, 
and widow,” is transformed into an arrangement by 
which, in the polygynic or monogamic family, the next 
brother loses by having to take steps for excluding him¬ 
self from the succession. 

The flaw in Mr. McLennan’s argument appears to me 
6 


74 


A REJOINDER TO MR. McLENNAN. 


to be this. He tacitly assumes that the succession of 
brothers to property, instead of sons, always implies the 
pre-existence of polyandry; whereas it merely implies 
the pre-existence of descent in the female line, w T hich 
may or may not have had polyandry as a concomitant. 
There are hosts of cases where descent in the female line 
exists, and where there is neither polyandry now nor any 
sign of its past existence. 

In the small space available, I must meet Mr. McLen¬ 
nan^ rejoinders to my criticisms on his theory of primi¬ 
tive marriage, in the briefest manner. He sets forth his 
leading propositions thus:— 

(1.) That “ the form [of capture] represents and is a 
remainder of an actual system of capturing women for 
wives.” As showing that the form does not necessarily 
imply capture from foreign tribes, I have pointed out 
that actual capture, and consequently the form of cap¬ 
ture, may originate within the tribe; first, from the fight¬ 
ing of the men with one another for the possession of 
women; second, from the resistance of the pursued 
women themselves, due to coyness, partly real and partly 
assumed; third, from the accompanying resistance of 
sympathizing women; and fourth, from the resistance 
of parents who are deprived of the services of daughters 
by their marriages. I have given numerous examples of 
acts of capture having such origins, and these Mr. Mc¬ 
Lennan passes over unnoticed. 

(2.) That “ a practice of capturing women for wives 
could not have become systematic unless it were devel¬ 
oped and sustained by some rule of law or custom, which 
made it necessary as a means to marriage.” This proposi¬ 
tion implies that some “ rule of law ” was first estab- 


A REJOINDER TO MR. McLENNAN. 75 

lished, in some way unspecified, and that capturing 
women became systematic as a consequence; which is 
not a solution of the problem but a postponement of it. 
The assumed pre-existence of such a law seems to me akin 
to the hypothesis of a primitive “ social contract.” 

(3.) That “ the rule of law or custom which had this 
effect was exogamy, the law (previously unnamed) which 
declared it incest for a man to marry a woman of the same 
blood or stock with himself.” On which my comment, 
simply a more specific form of the last, is that we are 
thus required to conclude that the notions of “ blood or 
stock ” and of “ incest ” preceded the practice of stealing 
women; though this practice, found among the very low¬ 
est men, is a natural sequence of instincts which must 
have been in action before the earliest social groups were 
formed. 

From these general rejoinders I pass to more special 
ones. 

Mr. McLennan says:—“ In this inquiry it was the 
existence of exogamy as an essential concomitant of cap¬ 
ture that concerned me. I neither investigated nor had 
occasion to investigate its origin.” Considering that the 
title of Mr. McLennan’s work as originally published 
was Primitive Marriage: an Inquiry into the Origin of 
the Form of Capture in Marriage Ceremonies , it seems 
strange that he should say he was not concerned with 
the explanation of exogamy. To ascribe capture to exo¬ 
gamy and to assign no cause for exogamy, is to give a 
very inadequate theory of primitive marriage. Mr. Mc¬ 
Lennan, however, while alleging that this problem did 
not concern him, says he threw out the suggestion that 
“ practice of female infanticide ” originated the correla¬ 
tive usages of capture and exogamy. I was quite un- 


76 A REJOINDER TO MR. McLENNAN. 

aware till now that Mr. McLennan laid so little stress 
upon this part of the theory. The title he gives to Chap¬ 
ter VII. of his work—“ Exogamy: its Origin/’ &c., 
seems to imply that the explanation of it did concern 
him, though he now says it did not. In this chapter (pp. 
110, 111, new edition), he assigns female infanticide as 
the cause, without any warning that this is to be taken 
merely as a suggestion. And to the growth of the con¬ 
sequent u usage induced by necessity ” of stealing wives, 
he ascribes the “ prejudice strong as a principle of re¬ 
ligion . . . against marrying women of their own 
stock,”—ascribes, that is, the law of exogamy. I have 
given several reasons for concluding that exogamy did 
not arise from this cause; and, as Mr. McLennan now 
states that what he said about this cause had “ perhaps 
better have been left unsaid,” I presume that he admits 
the- validity of these reasons. 

Mr. McLennan makes a counter criticism on the ex¬ 
planation of exogamy given by me. This explanation is 
that in warlike tribes, capturing of a foreign woman, im- 
plying conquest over enemies, was a mark of bravery and 
therefore honourable; that as a tribe became predomi¬ 
nantly warlike, the honourableness of having a foreign 
wife became, so relatively great, that taking a native 
wife became discreditable; and that finally, in the most 
warlike tribes, it became imperative that a wife should 
be of foreign blood. Mr. McLennan objects that there 
is a gulf “ between an act which is discreditable and an 
act which is criminal.” 

“ T° me ?” he says, “ it seems simply not possible to 
deduce from marriages with foreign women being 
deemed ever so honourable, that marriages with native 
women should be branded as incestuous—be deemed 


A REJOINDER TO MR. McLENNAN. 


11 

among the most impious of actions, and become capital 
offences.” 

My first reply is that though this “ seems simply not 
possible ” to Mr. McLennan, he might have found ana¬ 
logies which would show him its possibility. Is it not 
deemed honourable to conquer in war? Does it not be¬ 
come by consequence dishonourable to give way in battle 
and flee from the enemy? And are there not cases in 
which the dishonourableness of fleeing from the enemy 
became a penal offence, followed sometimes even by 
death? My second reply is that in the primitive state 
to which we must go back for the explanation of such 
practices as exogamy, no such notion as that of crime 
exists. Mr. McLennan’s objection implies the belief 
that moral ideas antecede the earliest social state; whereas 
they are products of the social state, developing only 
as it advances. What we call crimes are thought credi¬ 
table by many uncivilized men. Murder was no dis¬ 
grace to a Fijian, but a glory; and his honour increased 
with the number of men he devoured. Among some 
tribes of the Pacific States, where the stronger man takes 
whatever he pleases from the weaker, the criminality of 
robbery is unrecognised. And by those many peoples 
whom I have instanced ( Prin . of Sociology , § 281) as 
very commonly forming incestuous unions, incest is not 
regarded as criminal. How, then, can there be the im¬ 
passable gulf Mr. McLennan supposes between the dis- ' 
gracefulness of marrying within the tribe and the crime 
of incest, when, originally, incest was not a crime? 

By way of proof that among rude races a man does 
not gain honour from a captured wife, Mr. McLennan 
gives some cases showing that captured wives are not 



A REJOINDER TO MR. McLENNAN. 


78 

themselves held in higher estimation than native wives, 
hut in lower. I have neither said nor implied anything 
at variance with his facts. To assert the honourableness 
of capturing is not to assert the honourableness of being 
captured. 

One objection raised by Mr. McLennan to the ex¬ 
planation I have given has a considerable appearance of 
validity, and some real validity; though it is an impru¬ 
dent objection for him to make, since it tells against 
his own view more than against mine. He points out 
that if, in an extremely warlike tribe, wiving with for¬ 
eigners becomes imperative, and marriage with native- 
born women is disallowed, there arises the question, 
what becomes of the native-born women; and he says 
they must be “ doomed to perpetual celibacy.” In an¬ 
swer, I may point to the fact alleged by Mr. McLen¬ 
nan himself ( Studies , &c., p. 112), that in some cases 
all the female children born within the tribe are de¬ 
stroyed, whence it follows that, in these cases at any 
rate, there results no such difficulty as that which he 
alleges. Further, I have to repeat the objection made 
by me to his hypothesis, that among a cluster of tribes 
practising primitive exogamy, as Mr. McLennan de¬ 
scribes it, the female children born within each tribe not 
only become useless to the tribe, because unmarriage- 
able by its members, but the rearing of them benefits 
and strengthens hostile tribes, who alone can utilize 
them: whence a motive to universal female infanticide 
throughout the tribes. But the truth to which Mr. Mc¬ 
Lennan^ objection points, I take to be this; that, save 
in such extreme cases as the one I have cited above, 
exogamy, under that primitive form which implies 
actual capture of women from other tribes, does not be- 


A REJOINDER TO MR. McLENNAN. ^9 

come absolute; and that it acquires the character of a 
peremptory law, only when the prevalence of women 
counted as foreign by blood within the tribe, introduces 
the secondary or derived form of exogamy, and makes 
obedience to the peremptory law practicable. 

Mr. McLennan alleges that the explanation I have 
given could account “ only for a limited practice of cap¬ 
turing women for wives/’ and that for this reason, “ ap¬ 
parently,” I have formed the opinion that exogamy is 
not normal but exceptional. I do not know why he says 
this; since the explanation I have given implies that 
everywhere, hostilities among tribes tend to produce ex¬ 
ogamy in some and endogamy in others, and that thus 
the simultaneous genesis of the two is normal. If, how¬ 
ever, by the words “ that exogamy, properly so-called, 
was normal, is beyond dispute,” he means that it was 
normal in the literal sense, as having originally been the 
rule and other practices exceptions—if he means again 
to express the belief he did originally, that exogamy has 
“ been practised at a certain stage among every race of 
mankind ”—if, by the additional instances of it which 
he now gives, he means to support this proposition; then 
I have simply to set against it the admission he makes 
{Studies, & c., p. 116) that exogamy and endogamy “ may 
be equally archaic,” and the statement that “ the sepa¬ 
rate endogamous are nearly as numerous, and they are 
in some respects as rude, as the separate exogamous 
tribes ” {Ibid., p. 116)—an admission and a statement 
which harmonize perfectly with the hypothesis I have set 
forth, but are incongruous with Mr. McLennan’s own 
hypothesis. 

I have reserved to the last the most serious of Mr. Mc- 
Lennan’s allegations against me. “ That Mr. Spencer 



80 


A REJOINDER TO MR. McLENNAN. 


lias failed to grasp the meaning of the terms exogamy 
and endogamy appears beyond dispute/ 7 he says. If this 
he true, the fault must be either in Mr. McLennan’s 
statement of his views, or in my capacity for compre¬ 
hension; and I suppose that in politeness I am bound 
to regard the fault as lying in me. I am reluctant, how¬ 
ever, to leave the reader without the opportunity of form¬ 
ing his own judgment on this point; and I therefore 
lay before him the data as briefly as consists with clear¬ 
ness. 

The question being how there arose the contrast be¬ 
tween those tribes which married only with women of 
other tribes, or of foreign blood, and those tribes which 
married native women, the words “ exogamy 77 and “ en¬ 
dogamy, 77 introduced by Mr. McLennan, were used by 
me as indicating these two systems, alike in their partial¬ 
ly-established and in their completely-established forms. 
Employing the words in these unspecialized senses, I 
have referred to some societies as partially exogamous 
or partially endogamous, and have said that “ exogamy 
and endogamy in many cases co-exist: 77 meaning, there¬ 
by, that in so far as the men of a tribe marry out of 
the tribe the tribe is exogamous, and in so far as they 
marry within the tribe the tribe is endogamous. This 
fact is cited by Mr. McLennan as “ proof that the prob¬ 
lem never was comprehended by 77 me. Giving to the 
words more special meanings than are necessitated by 
their literal significations, Mr. McLennan represents 
them as applicable only where marriage with women 
of the same stock is respectively forbidden or required. 
There cannot, consequently, be such things as partial 
exogamy or endogamy—the two are mutually exclu¬ 
sive. “ The words, 77 he says, “ were not defined by me 


A REJOINDER TO MR. McLENNAN. 


81 


to denote practices at all, but rules or laws; ” and be 
says that until there is actual prohibition of one or other, 
there is no law of marriage at all, and therefore no ex¬ 
ogamy or endogamy. 

Now Mr. McLennan may, of course, give what de¬ 
finitions he pleases to words introduced by himself. But 
I am at los3 to understand how an evolutionist, which 
Mr. McLennan declares himself to be, can ignore those 
antecedent stages that must have been passed through 
before exogamy and endogamy could become laws. Mr. 
McLennan’s familiarity with savage life must make him 
fully conscious that law, in our sense, is originally un¬ 
known; and that that genesis of laws out of customs 
which advanced societies show us, is implied by the state 
of the earliest societies in which no customs have yet 
evolved into laws. An evolutionist might be expected 
to regard it as a necessary implication that before exog¬ 
amy and endogamy became laws they must have been 
practices. 

If, instead of saying that I “ never comprehended the 
meanings of the terms exogamy or endogamy,” Mr. 
McLennan had said that I failed to comprehend how he 
reconciles his own uses of them with the meanings he 
gives, I should have agreed with him. On p. 230 in the 
chapter headed “ Conclusion/’ (not, be it observed, in 
the chapter which he describes as “ preliminary/’ and 
therefore only approximate in its statements) I find the 
following passage, in which I have italicised the signi¬ 
ficant words: 

u On the whole, the account which we have given of 
the origin of exogamy appears the only one which will 
bear examination. The scarcity of women within the 
group led to a practice of stealing the women of other 


82 PROF. TAIT ON THE FORMULA OF EVOLUTION. 

groups, and in time it came to be considered improper , 
because it was unusual for a man to marry a woman of 
bis own group.” 

This passage, summing up the results of Mr. McLen¬ 
nan^ inquiries, while it tacitly asserts that “ the origin 
of exogamy ” was a chief problem (though Mr. McLen¬ 
nan now says it did not concern him), applies the name 
exogamy to a practice that had not yet become a law. 
Even now, on the first page of the above article, he uses 
it in the same sense when he speaks of his original sug¬ 
gestion thus—“ the practice of capture somehow intro¬ 
ducing exogamy, and exogamy thereafter perpetuating 
and extending the practice of capture.” If, then, be¬ 
cause I have applied the name exogamy to a growing 
custom that had not yet hardened into a law, I am 
charged with not understanding what exogamy means, 
I have simply to reply that the charge recoils with fatal 
effect on Mr. McLennan himself; since he uses the word 
in the same sense. 

1 PROF. TAIT ON THE FORMULA OF 
EVOLUTION. 

It would be undesirable to give permanence to the 
subjoined communication, published in Nature for Dec. 
2, 1880, were it not that it serves as a text for some re¬ 
marks on scientific culture and the perverting influences 
caused by limitation of it to special sciences. 

Initiated by a criticism of First Principles in the 
British Quarterly Review for October, 1873, there grew 


PROF. TAIT ON THE FORMULA OF EVOLUTION. 83 

up a controversy carried on partly in pamphlets which 
I published and partly in the columns of Nature. In the 
course of it Prof. Tait, who, as a high authority, was 
quoted against me, became implicated and himself event¬ 
ually entered the lists. Some time afterwards he uttered 
from his professorial chair at Edinburgh an address con¬ 
demnatory of my views. It was published in Nature 
for Nov. 25, 1880, and drew from me the reply here re¬ 
produced. 

Usually my polemical writings have, I believe, been 
considered as duly regardful of the feelings of antagon¬ 
ists. If an exception is here furnished, my excuse must 
be that I was, perhaps improperly, influenced by the 
example of Prof. Tait, who, repeating a comparison he 
made once before, told his students that—“ When the 
purposely vague statements of the materialists and ag¬ 
nostics are thus stripped of the tinsel of highflown and 
unintelligible language, the eyes of the thoughtless who 
have accepted them on authority (!) are at last opened, 
and they are ready to exclaim with Titania ‘ Methinks I 
was enamour’d of an ass’.” 

When, in Nature for July 17th, 1879, while review¬ 
ing Sir Edmund Beckett’s book, Prof. Tait lugged in 
Mr. Kirkman’s travesty of the definition of Evolution, 
most readers probably failed to see why he made this 
not very relevant quotation. But those who remembered 
a controversy which occurred some years previously, pos¬ 
sibly divined the feeling which prompted him thus to go 
out of his way. 


84 PROF. TA1T ON THE FORMULA OF EVOLUTION. 

At tlie time I said nothing; but having recently had 
to prepare a new edition of First Principles , and think¬ 
ing it well to take some notice of books, and parts of 
books, that have been written in refutation of that work, 
I decided to deal also with Mr. Kirkman’s implied cri¬ 
ticism, in which Prof. Tait so heartily concurred; and 
by way of gauging Prof. Tait’s judgment on this matter, 
I thought it not amiss to give some samples of his judg¬ 
ment on matters falling within his own department. To 
make it accessible to those possessing previous editions 
of First Principles , the Appendix containing these re¬ 
plies to critics was published as a pamphlet. 

In the inaugural lecture of this session, recently given 
to his students, part of which is published in the last 
number of Nature , Prof. Tait first of all recalls a pas¬ 
sage from the preceding controversy. From this he 
quotes, or rather describes, a clause which, standing by 
itself, appears sufficiently absurd; and he marks the ab¬ 
surdity by a double note of admiration. Whether when 
taken with its context it is absurd, the reader will 
be able to judge on reading the passage to which it 
belongs. 

In disproof of certain conclusions of mine, there had 
been quoted against me the dictum of Prof. Tait con¬ 
cerning the laws of motion, which is that—“ as the prop¬ 
erties of matter might have been such as to render a 
totally different set of laws axiomatic, these laws must 
be considered as resting on convictions drawn from ob¬ 
servation and experiment and not on intuitive percep¬ 
tion.” Not urging minor objections to this dictum , I 
went on to say:—“ It will suffice if I examine the nature 
of this proposition that ‘ the properties of matter might 
have been ’ other than they are. Does it express an ex- 


PROF. TAIT ON THE FORMULA OF EVOLUTION. 85 

perimentally-ascertained truth? If so, I invite Prof. 
Tait to describe the experiments? Is it an intuition? If 
so, then along with doubt of an intuitive belief concern¬ 
ing things as they are , there goes confidence in an in¬ 
tuitive belief concerning things as they are not. Is it an 
hypothesis? If so, the implication is that a cognition of 
which the negation is inconceivable (for an axiom is 
such) may be discredited by inference from that which 
is not a cognition at all, but simply a supposition. . . . 
I shall take it as unquestionable that nothing concluded 
can have a warrant higher than that from which it is 
concluded, though it may have a lower. Now the ele¬ 
ments of the proposition before us are these :—As i the 
properties of matter might have been such as to render a 
totally different set of laws axiomatic ’ [ therefore ] i these 
laws [now in force] must be considered as resting . . . 
not on intuitive perception: ’ that is, the intuitions in 
which these laws are recognised, must not be held au¬ 
thoritative. Here the cognition posited as premiss, is 
that the properties of matter might have been other than 
they are; and the conclusion is that our intuitions rela¬ 
tive to existing properties are uncertain. Hence, if this 
conclusion is valid, it is valid because the cognition or 
intuition respecting what might have been, is more trust¬ 
worthy than the cognition or intuition respecting what 
is!” 

From which it is manifest that, when asking (of 
course ironically) whether this alleged truth was an ex¬ 
perimentally-ascertained one, my purpose was partly to 
enumerate and test all imaginable suppositions respect¬ 
ing the nature of Prof. Tait’s proposition, and partly to 
show that he had affirmed something concerning the 
properties of matter which cannot be experimentally 


86 PROF. TAIT ON THE FORMULA OF EVOLUTION. 


verified, and therefore which, by his own showing, he 
has no right to affirm. 

The first example which, in my recent replies to 
criticisms, I have given of Prof. Tait’s way of thinking, 
is disclosed by a comparison of his views concerning onr 
knowledge of the universe as visible to us, and our 
knowledge of an alleged invisible universe. This com¬ 
parison shows that:— 

“ He thinks that while no validity can be claimed 
for our judgments respecting perceived forces, save as 
experimentally justified, some validity can be claimed 
for our judgments respecting unperceived forces, where 
no experimental justification is possible.” 

Part of Prof. Tait’s answer is that “ the theory there 
developed [in the Unseen Universe'] was not put for¬ 
ward as probable, its purpose was attained when it was 
shown to be conceivable.” To which I rejoin that 
whereas Prof. Tait said he found in this theory a sup¬ 
port for certain theological beliefs, he now confesses that 
he found none; for if no probability is alleged, no sup¬ 
port can be derived. The other part of his answer con¬ 
cerns the main issue. After pointing out that the argu¬ 
ment of this work, “ carried on in pursuance of physical 
laws established by converse with the universe we know, 
extends them to the universe we do not know,” I had 
urged that if we have u no warrant for asserting a phys¬ 
ical axiom save as a generalisation of results of experi¬ 
ments—if, consequently, where no observation or experi¬ 
ment is possible, reasoning after physical methods can 
have no place; then there can be no basis for any con¬ 
clusion respecting the physical relations of the seen and 
the unseen universes,” “ since, by the definition of it, 
one term of the relation is abseht.” Prof. Tait’s ex- 


PROF. TAIT ON THE FORMULA OF EVOLUTION. 87 

planation is extremely startling. When following the 
discussion in the Unseen Universe , throughout which 
the law of the Conservation of Energy and the Principle 
of Continuity are extended from the tangible and visible 
matter and motion around us to an unknown form of 
existence with which they are supposed to be connected, 
readers little thought that Prof. Tait meant by this un¬ 
known form of existence his own mind. Yet this is all 
that he now names as the missing term of the relation 
between the seen universe and the unseen universe. 

The second sample which I gave of Prof. Tait’s views 
on matters pertaining to his own subject, concerned the 
nature of inertia, which he describes by implication as 
a positive force. Here I quoted Prof. Clerk Maxwell. 
To repeat his criticism in full would cause me to tres¬ 
pass on the pages of Nature even more unduly than I 
must do. If, however, any reader turns to Nature , July 
3rd, 1879, and reads the passage in question, he will be 
able to judge whether it is, or is not, a joke, and if a 
joke, at whose expense. Meanwhile, the essential ques¬ 
tion remains. Prof. Tait says that matter has “ an in¬ 
nate power of resisting external influences.” I, con¬ 
trariwise, say that the assertion of such a power is at 
variance with established physical principles. 

One further illustration of Prof. Tait’s way of think¬ 
ing was added. Quoting from a lecture given by him at 
Glasgow, for the purpose of dispelling “ the widespread 
ignorance as to some of the most important elementary 
principles of physics,” I compared two different defini¬ 
tions of force it contained. In a passage from Hewton, 
emphatically approved by Prof. Tait, force is implied 
to be that which changes the state of a body, or, in mod¬ 
ern language, does work upon it. Later on in the lec- 


88 PROF. TAIT ON THE FORMULA OF EVOLUTION. 

ture, Prof. Tait says—“ force is the rate at which an 
agent does work per unit of length.” I contended that 
these definitions are irreconcilable with one another; 
and I do not see that Prof. Tait has done anything to 
reconcile them. True, he has given us some mathe¬ 
matics, by which he considers the reconciliation to be 
effected; and, possibly, some readers, awed by his equa¬ 
tions, and forgetting that in symbolic operations, carried 
on no matter how rigourously, the worth of what comes 
out depends wholly on what is put in, will suppose that 
Prof. Tait must be right. If, however, his mathematics 
prove that while force is an agent which does work, it is 
also the rate at which an agent does work, then I say— 
so much the worse for his mathematics. 

From these several tests of Prof. Tait’s judgment, 
in respect to which I fail to see that he has disposed of 
my allegations, I pass now to his implied judgment on 
the formula, or definition, of Evolution. And here I 
have, first to ask him some questions. He says that be¬ 
cause he has used the word “ definition ” instead of 
(( formula,” he has incurred my “ sore displeasure and 
grave censure.” In what place have I expressed or im¬ 
plied displeasure or censure in relation to this substitu¬ 
tion of terms? Alleging that I have an obvious motive 
for calling it a “ formula,” he says I am “ indignant at 
its being called a definition .” I wish to see the words 
in which I have expressed my indignation; and shall be 
glad if Prof. Tait will quote them. He says—“ It seems 
I should have called him the discoverer of the formula! ” 
instead of “ the inventor of the definition.” Will he 
oblige me by pointing out where I have used either the 
one phrase or the other? These assertions of Prof. Tait 
are to me utterly incomprehensible. I have nowhere 


PROF. TAIT ON THE FORMULA OF EVOLUTION. 89 


either said or implied any of the things which he here 
specifies. So far am I from consciously preferring one 
of these words to the other, that, until I read this pas¬ 
sage in Prof. Tait’s lecture, I did not even know that 
I was in the habit of saying “ formula ” rather than 
“ definition.” The whole of these statements are fic¬ 
tions, pure and absolute. 

My intentional use of the one word rather than the 
other, is alleged by him a propos of an incidental com¬ 
parison I have made. To a critic who had said that the 
formula or definition of Evolution “ seems at best rather 
the blank form for a universe than anything correspond¬ 
ing to the actual world about us,” I had replied that it 
might similarly be “ remarked that the formula — 1 bodies 
attract one another directly as their masses and inversely 
as the squares of their distances/ was at best but a blank 
form for solar systems and sidereal clusters.” Where¬ 
upon Prof. Tait assumes that I put the “ Formula of 
Evolution alongside of the Law of Gravitation,” in re¬ 
spect to the definiteness of the previsions they severally 
enable us to make; and he proceeds to twit me with in¬ 
ability to predict what will be the condition of Europe 
four years hence, as astronomers “ predict the positions 
of known celestial bodies four years beforehand.” Here 
we have another example of Prof. Tait’s peculiarity of 
thought. Because two abstract generalisations are com¬ 
pared as both being utterly unlike the groups of con¬ 
crete facts interpreted by them, therefore they are com¬ 
pared in respect to their other characters. 

But now I am not unwilling to deal with the contrast 
Prof. Tait draws; and am prepared to show that when 
the conditions are analogous, the contrast disappears. It 
seems strange that I should have to point out to a scien- 
7 


90 PROF. TAIT ON THE FORMULA OF EVOLUTION. 

tific man in liis position, that an alleged law may be 
perfectly true, and that yet, where the elements of a 
problem to be dealt with under it are numerous, no spe¬ 
cific deduction can be drawn. Does not Prof. Tait from 
time to time teach his students that in proportion as the 
number of factors concerned in the production of any 
phenomenon becomes great, and also in proportion as 
those factors admit of less exact measurement, any pre¬ 
diction made concerning the phenomenon becomes less 
definite; and that where the factors are multitudinous 
and not measurable, nothing but some general result can 
be foreseen, and often not even that? Prof. Tail ignores 
the fact that the positions of planets and satellites admit 
of definite prevision, only because the forces which ap¬ 
preciably affect them are few; and he ignores the fact 
that where further such forces, not easily measured, come 
into play, the previsions are imperfect and often wholly 
wrong, as in the case of comets; and he ignores the fact 
that where the number of bodies affecting one another 
by mutual gravitation is great, no definite prevision of 
their positions is possible. If Prof. Tait were living in 
one of the globular star-clusters, does he think that after 
observations duly taken, calculations based on the law 
of gravitation would enable him to predict the positions 
of the component stars four years hence? By an intel¬ 
ligence immeasurably transcending the human, with a 
mathematics to match, such prevision would doubtless 
be possible; but considered from the human standpoint, 
the law of gravitation even when uncomplicated by other 
laws, can yield under such conditions only general and 
not special results. And if Prof. Tait will deign to look 
into First Principles , which he apparently prides him¬ 
self on not having done, he will there find a sufficient 


PROF. TAIT ON THE FORMULA OF EVOLUTION. 91 

number of illustrations showing that not only orders 
of changes, but even social changes, are predictable in 
respect to their general, if not in respect to their special, 
characters. 

There remains only to notice the opinion which Prof. 
Tait seems still to hold, that the verbal transformation 
which Mr. Kirkman has made in the formula or defini¬ 
tion of Evolution, suffices to show its hollowness. Here 
I may be excused for repeating what I have already said 
elsewhere, namely, that “ We may conveniently observe 
the nature of Mr. Kirkman’s belief, by listening to an 
imaginary addition to that address before the Literary 
and Philosophical Society of Liverpool, in which he first 
set forth the leading ideas of his volume; and we may 
fitly, in this imaginary addition, adopt the manner in 
which he delights. 

“ Observe, gentlemen,” we may suppose him saying, 
“ I have here the yolk of an egg. The evolutionists, 
using their jargon, say that one of its characters is 
‘ homogeneity ’; and if you do not examine your 
thoughts, perhaps you may think that the word conveys 
some idea. But now if I translate it into plain English, 
and say that one of the characters of this yolk is ‘ all- 
alikeness/ you at once perceive how nonsensical is their 
statement. You see that the substance of the yolk is not 
all-alike, and that therefore all-alikeness cannot be one 
of its attributes. Similarly with the other pretentious 
term ‘ heterogeneity/ which, according to them, de¬ 
scribes the state things are brought to by what they 
call evolution. It is mere empty sound, as is manifest 
if I do but transform it, as I did the other, and say in¬ 
stead ‘ not-all-alikeness.’ For on showing you this chick 
into which the yolk of the egg turns, you will see that 


92 PROF. TAIT ON THE FORMULA OF EVOLU. 


4 not-all-alikeness ’ is a character which cannot be claimed 
for it. How can any one say that the parts of the chick 
are not-all-alike ? Again, in their blatant language we 
are told that evolution is carried on by continuous 4 dif¬ 
ferentiations ’; and they would have us believe that this 
word expresses some fact. But if we put instead of it 
4 somethingelseifications ’ the delusion they try to prac¬ 
tise on us becomes clear. How can they say that while 
the parts have been forming themselves the heart has 
been becoming something else than the stomach, and 
the leg something else than the wing, and the head some¬ 
thing else than the tail? The like manifestly happens 
when for 4 integrations ’ we read 4 sticktogetherations ’; 
what sense the term might seem to have, becomes obvious 
nonsense when the substituted word is used. For no¬ 
body dares assert that the parts of the chick stick to¬ 
gether any more than do the parts of the yolk. I need 
hardly show you that now when I take a portion of the 
yolk between my fingers and pull, and now when I take 
any part of the chick, as the leg, and pull, the first re¬ 
sists just as much as the last—the last does not stick to¬ 
gether any more than the first; so that there has been 
no progress in 4 sticktogetherations.’ And thus, gentle¬ 
men, you perceive that these big words which, to the 
disgrace of the Royal Society, appear even in papers 
published by it, are mere empty bladders which these 
would-be philosophers use to buoy up their ridiculous 
doctrines.” 

But though it is here, I think, made apparent enough 
that even when disguised in Mr. Kirkman’s grotesque 
words, the definition of Evolution continues truly to ex¬ 
press the facts, Prof. Tait shows no sign of changing 
his original opinion that Mr. Kirkman has made 44 an 


PROF. TAIT ON THE FORMULA OF EVOLUTION. 93 

exquisite translation ” of the definition. Nay, so charmed 
does he appear to be with Mr. Kirkman’s feats of this 
nature, that he gives us another of them. One of two 
conclusions must be drawn. Prof. Tait either thinks 
that fallacies are disclosed by the aid of these cacophon¬ 
ous long words, or else the clatter of curious syllabic 
compounds greatly excites his sense of humour. In the 
last case we may infer that had he been one of that 
“ Twelfth Night ” party in which the Clown exclaims— 
“ I did impeticos thy gratillity,” he would have joined 
in Sir Andrew Aguecheek’s applause. 

In his essay on “ The Study of Mathematics as an 
Exercise of the Mind,” Sir William Hamilton insisted 
with great force upon the unfitness of mathematically- 
disciplined men for contingent reasoning: giving proof 
that “ a too exclusive study of these sciences is, abso¬ 
lutely, to disqualify the mind for observation and com¬ 
mon reasoning.” In support of this thesis he marshalled 
numerous high authorities, including, along with vari¬ 
ous distinguished non-mathematicians, the mathema¬ 
ticians themselves—Pascal, Descartes, D’Alembert, and 
others. To earlier examples of mental defects produced, 
which might be given, a conspicuous addition has been 
supplied recently: that furnished by M. Michel Chasles, 
who, in the matter of the Newton-Pascal forgeries, sur¬ 
prised both the scientific world and the world at large 
by his extreme inability to judge of evidence and detect 
imposture. Personal experience has yielded verification. 
Observation of one much devoted to geometry forced on 


94 PROF. TAIT ON THE FORMULA OF EVOLUTION. 

me the conclusion that a prevailing fault in general rea¬ 
soning had been produced in him. Such a result is not 
to be wondered at. The mathematician does not deal 
with many indefinite data, hut with a few definite ones. 
In his operations there occurs no collecting of evidence: 
his successive inferences are inevitable implications. 
Balancing of probabilities is never thought of: his de¬ 
ductions are necessary and unqualified. The mode of 
thought generated affects his reasoning about other 
matters than the mathematical and the mathematico- 
physical. Assuming simplicity and definiteness of data 
where these do not exist, he draws conclusions which, 
as being drawn mathematically, he thinks unquestion¬ 
able. A distinguished mathematician and physicist now 
living has more than once illustrated this truth. 

A further mental effect is produced. The habit of 
dealing with conclusions from data that are few and 
exact, appears to entail an inability to recognize the con¬ 
clusions drawn from inexact and complex data as con¬ 
stituting parts of scientific knowledge. In the minds of 
those thus characterized science exists as a multitude 
of separate demonstrated propositions; and it never 
occurs to them that in the order of Nature these must 
be parts of a whole. The merging of them in some uni¬ 
versal truth is an idea so alien that the very terms re¬ 
quired seem meaningless, and the man who uses them a 
charlatan. If, referring to an architect, a mason should 
say—“ He a builder! Why he never dressed a stone in 
his life! ” he would betray a feeling not altogether dis- 


PROF. TA1T ON THE FORMULA OF EVOLUTION. 


95 


similar. Already in the appendix to First Principles 
above referred to, I have pointed out how some men of 
letters and some mathematicians, alike in having minds 
insufficiently supplied with the materials out of which 
the conception of Evolution is to be framed, regard the 
definition of Evolution as a combination of empty words: 
Prof. Tait and Mr. Kirkman being named in illustra¬ 
tion. And I ought to have there added the illustration 
furnished by a Senior Wrangler who reviewed First 
Principles in the British Quarterly Review for October 
1873, and with whom I subsequently carried on a con¬ 
troversy. 

Since then two further illustrations have come to my 
knowledge. One is contained in the Life of the late Dr. 
Romanes. Writing to Mr. Darwin in 1880, and return¬ 
ing some letters, he says 

“ The latter convey exactly the criticism that I 
should have expected from—, for while writing my 
essay on Theism I had several conversations with him 
upon the subject of Spencer’s writings, and so know 
exactly what he thinks of them. But in none of these 
conversations could I get at anything more definite than 
is conveyed by the returned letters. In no point of any 
importance did he make it clear to me that Spencer was 
wrong, and the only result of our conversation was to 
show me that in —’s opinion it was only my ignorance 
of mathematics that prevented me from seeing that 
Mr. Spencer is merely a ‘ word philosopher ’ . . .” (pp. 
95—6). 

The other illustration, of somewhat earlier date, will 
be found in the Edinburgh Review for January 1884. 


96 PROP. TAIT ON THE FORMULA OF EVOLUTION. 

The writer of it was among the wranglers of his year. 
His characterization of First Principles runs as fol¬ 
lows:—This is nothing but a philosophy of epithets 
and phrases , introduced and carried on with an un¬ 
rivalled solemnity and affection of precision of style, 
concealing the loosest reasoning and the haziest indefi- 
niteness.” * 

This instancing of five men, occupied with mathe¬ 
matics and mathematical physics, in whose minds the 
formula of Evolution raised no answering conception, 
may be thought to imply an undervaluation, if not even 
a reprobation, of mathematics and physics as subjects 
of study. Ho inference could be more erroneous. To 
guard against it, however, let me point out that while 
exclusive devotion to the exact sciences produces certain 
defects of thought, exclusive devotion to the inexact 
sciences produces defects of thought of an opposite kind. 
These last present phenomena under such complex forms, 
with interdependencies so involved, that necessities of 
relation cannot in most cases be said to exist; and the 
many causes simultaneously in operation so obscure the 
action of any one, as in large measure to exclude the 
idea of definite causation. Among plants a few funda- 

* Some amusement was caused by the mode in which I dealt with 
this sweeping condemnation. It appeared just before the sixth edi¬ 
tion of First Principles was issued. In pursuance of my directions, 
Messrs. Williams and Norgate, when sending out advertisements of 
this new edition, appended to each of them the above sentences, as 
expressing the opinion of the Edinburgh Review. The advertise¬ 
ments were published in all the leading daily and weekly papers. 


PROF. TAIT ON THE FORMULA OF EVOLUTION. 97 

mental relations may be fairly alleged, as between the 
monocotyledonous germination and the endogenous 
mode of growth, or between the dicotyledonous germina¬ 
tion and the exogenous mode of growth. But relations 
among multitudinous combined traits, such as kind of 
fructification and possession of thorns, or hard-shelled 
nuts and shapes of leaves, cannot be shown to have any 
causal characters. So with animals. Though it is a 
trait of creatures having mammae to have seven cervical 
vertebrae, yet for this correlation of structures no neces¬ 
sity can be alleged; as is proved by the fact that though 
at one time the connexion was supposed to be universal, 
there have of late years been discovered mammals hav¬ 
ing eight vertebrae in the neck. Hence, those who ex¬ 
clusively study animals and plants, being perpetually 
impressed by connexions of facts which are either for¬ 
tuitous or for which no reason can be assigned, are not 
daily habituated to the perception of causal relations, 
and such generalizations as they can establish come to 
be regarded as empirical. A purely inductive habit is 
encouraged and a deductive habit discouraged. The 
resulting mental tendencies operate in other regions of 
thought, so that everywhere necessity of relation is 
doubted, and the idea of inevitable consequence meets 
with no acceptance. Many times in a distinguished biol¬ 
ogist I have observed the effect thus described. Present 
him with a great accumulation of evidence supporting 
a certain conclusion, and this conclusion, coming before 
him under the form of an induction, he would entertain 


98 PROF. TAIT ON THE FORMULA OF EVOLUTION. 

and seem ready to accept. After a time point out that 
this conclusion might be reached deductively from 
known necessary truths, and immediately his scepticism 
was aroused. Forgetting the inductive basis originally 
assigned, the deductive proof excited such repugnance 
as tended to make him reject what he before admitted. 
The habit of mind encouraged by dealing exclusively 
with empirical generalizations produced an abnormal 
distrust of all others. 

Is it then that ability to form balanced judgments 
about things at large demands discipline in all the sci¬ 
ences? The answer is Yes and No. And here presents 
itself a question often raised and never settled—Is it 
better to have an extensive or fairly complete knowledge 
of a single science, or a general acquaintance with all 
the sciences? The tacit implication is that the choice 
is between restriction with accuracy and breadth with 
superficiality. But this is not true. The error lies in 
supposing that a general knowledge is the same thing 
as a superficial knowledge. There may be full compre¬ 
hension of the essentials of a science without familiarity 
with its details—a clear understanding of those funda¬ 
mental truths from which all the multitudinous minor 
truths constituting it are deductions. Take the case of 
mechanics. In a moderate time a student may master 
its cardinal ideas—the composition and resolution of 
forces; the general principle of inertia; the laws of mo¬ 
tion, including acceleration and retardation and the 
various compoundings of motions, studied in connexion 


ABILITY VERSUS INFORMATION. 


99 


with the conservation of energy; the doctrine of stable 
and unstable equilibrium, with the relations of statics 
and dynamics; and may add to these the theorems con¬ 
cerning the mechanical powers. The abstract truths 
comprehended under these heads having been severally 
brought home in connexion with some concrete applica¬ 
tions, an adequate grasp of mechanical principles is ob¬ 
tained, which, though only general, is not superficial; 
and which gives the power intelligently to appreciate 
the higher and more complex conclusions of the science 
when upon occasion they are presented. Kindred courses 
may similarly bring within the student’s clear compre¬ 
hension the fundamentals of all the sciences; and he will 
then be in a condition for devoting himself efficiently to 
the science he prefers. Alike for the sake of knowledge 
and for the sake of discipline the ideal course of culture 
is—the ground truths of each science joined with mas¬ 
tery of one. 


ABILITY VERSUS INFOKMATIOK 

Among my papers I find in print the following letter 
written to Dr. (now Sir) Henry Acland. Under what 
circumstances it was written I do not know; nor can I 
remember in what shape it was published. Probably it 
formed part of some collection of opinions respecting 
University Education, issued in 1882: the date of it 
being March 4 of that year. I give it a place here as 


100 


ABILITY VERSUS INFORMATION. 


expressing a strong conviction of mine concerning the 
quality of ordinary intellectual culture. 

I am just now allowing myself, very imprudently, 
to be drawn away from my usual line of work, and am 
therefore the less able to consider at length the matter 
to which your letter of the 2nd draws my attention. 
Moreover, I feel that even had I any amount of energy 
to spare, my opinion upon the details of the proposed 
forms of examination would not be of much value. 

There is only, one general criticism which I feel in¬ 
clined to make upon the examination papers you have 
forwarded—a criticism to which I think they are open 
in common with examination papers at large. They are 
drawn up with the exclusive view of testing acquisition 
rather than 'power . I hold that the more important thing 
to be ascertained by an examination is not the quantity 
of knowledge which a man has taken in and is able to 
pour out again, but the ability he shows to use the 
knowledge he has acquired; and I think that examina¬ 
tions of all kinds are habitually faulty, inasmuch as they 
use the first test rather than the last, by which to judge 
of superiority. 

I hold that im every examination there should be a 
certain set of questions devised for the purpose of ascer¬ 
taining what capacity for original thinking the candi¬ 
date has—questions to which he will find no answer in 
the books that he has read, but to which answers must 
be elaborated by himself from reflection upon the knowl¬ 
edge he has acquired. To give an example of what I 
mean, there might be put to biological students in the 
physiological part of their examination such a question 
as—What are the other characteristics of the Aloe which 


BOOK-DISTRIBUTION. 


101 


are related to the long delay in its flowering, and which 
make this delay profitable to the species? If some few 
questions of this kind, for which the student was wholly 
unprepared, were included in every examination, they 
would serve to single out the few men who were some¬ 
thing more than mere passive recipients of book knowl¬ 
edge and professorial teaching. 


BOOK-DISTRIBUTION. 

When the late Mr. Fawcett was Postmaster-General 
I wrote to him a letter suggesting a system which would, 
it seemed to me, greatly facilitate (and therefore 
cheapen) the process of conveying books from publish¬ 
ers to readers. Nothing came of my proposal: the ex¬ 
isting facilities were held sufficient. I think it well, 
however, to give permanence to the suggestion, hoping 
that some future Postmaster-General may take a differ¬ 
ent view. The date of the letter was June 5, 1882. 

Thanks for your note some time since received, and 
for the copy of the Postal Guide drawing my attention 
to the postal order system. The unsatisfactoriness of 
this for the purpose I have in view is both that it in¬ 
volves a small tax and entails a considerable amount of 
clerical labour. 

Within these last few days I have hit upon a device 
which, it seems to me, solves the problem satisfactorily; 
and on discussing the matter with Dr. William Smith, 
whose wide experience as a publisher of dictionaries 















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